File Format:

Adobe Reader

Oral History Cover Sheet
of
Name: William F. Shake
Date of Interview: February 10, 2008
Location of Interview: PortlandTigard, Oregon at the home of Jerry Grover
Interviewer: Jerry C. Grover
Oral History Program
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
National Conservation Training Center
Shepherdstown, West Virginia
Approximate years worked for Fish and Wildlife
Service:
37½ years from 4/17/1967 to
12/31/2004
Offices and/ Field Stations Worked, Positions
Held:
Started outBill Shake began his career with the U.S. Fish &
Wildlife Service in Region 3 Minneapolis with as a temporary
appointment with in the Animal Damage Control ,( ADC)
program, in Lafayette, Indiana. His first permanent then got
permanent position was as a field biologist in Region 3 with
ADC . Then and was assigned to Ohio, few for several weeks,
to help the Wildlife Services program on Lake Erie., W when
finished , he with became the Assistant State Supervisor with
ADC in Lansing, Michigan. He then wWent to the Regional
Office in Minneapolis as a staff biologist with ADC/Wildlife
Services and, was the acting Endangered Species Biologist.
His next move was to Washington, then went to D.C., for the
year-long Departmental Manager Development Program (
DMDP) Program. Part of his training assignment was
withWorked for Dick Myshak, Deputy Assistant Secretary for
Fish, Wildlife & Parks on a task force to implement the Alaska
Native Clams Settlement Act. NextAt the completion of the
training program, he served as Wwaas staff biologist with the
Division of Program Plans in D.C. ,
in In 1982 he transferred to Region 1 Portland was as the
Assistant Regional Director (ARD) for Endangered Species
and Federal Aid, from there he went on to become then became
the Assistant to the ARD for Ecological Services, the Deputy
ARD for Fisheries eventually becoming the, then ARD for the
Fisheries Program of the Pacific Region. He then moved on to
become the multi-program Became was the Geographic ARD
for the Columbia River Basin. He and then becamecompleted
his career as the Special Assistant to the Regional Director for
the Columbia River issues.
Colleagues and Mentors: Dr. Hank Sather (professor),
Dick Smith, Dick Myshak, Fred QuartzelCourtsel, Wes Jones,
Jack Hemphill, Bob Herbst, Jack Berryman, Ed Verburg, Mike
Spear, Ed Chamberland, Wally Steucke, Joe Blum, Sandy
Wilbur, Wayne White, Gail Kobetich, Dave Riley, Fred
Vincent, Jim MorinWarrien.
Most Important Issues: Bill was intricately involved in
dDeveloping a wildlife resources restoration and management
plan for the Klamath River Basin in NothernNorthern
California, was the Service policy represenitiverepresentative
on the Pplanning process for the Columbia River dealing with
operations of the hydro-power system which is operated by the,
Bonneville Power Administration, Corps of Engineers and the
Bureau of Reclamation. He aAlso dealing represented the
Service on the with Snake River water rights adjudication
which involving involved the tribes, the and Bureau of
Reclamation and private water interestswater issue in Idaho.
The and NOAA Fisheries listing of the Pacific Salmon was also
a factor in the negotiations.
Bill and Deanna Shake - 2010
Brief Summary of Interview: Bill tTalks about where
he was born, growing up near the college he went to, becoming
interested in the outdoors and the Fish & Wildlife Service. He
talks about when he met his wife, going to college and graduate
school, getting a job with the FWS, getting married and having
two daughters. He talks about the various jobs that he has had
2
2
with the Service including working for Animal Damage Control/Wildlife Services, being in the Departmental Management Development P Program, and being ARD for various programs ofr the sServices. Bill talks about high about the high and low points of his career, things he thought were good ideas and others that he would consider doing over. He also talks about people who influenced him, and the good and bad changes or decisions that have occurred in the FWS. And he mentions some of the fun times that he has had working for FWS and he gives his final thoughts on his career, the accomplishments that were made and the people he worked with.
Insert
a
Picture
THE ORAL HISTORY
Jerry: This is Jerry Grover a retired Ecological Services & Fishery supervisor in the Portland Regional Office. This is Jerry Grover I’m doing an oral history today with, with Bill Shake regarding his career with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The purpose of this interview is part of a program to preserve the heritage and culture of the U. S. Fish & Wildlife Service through the eyes of its employees. Joining me us is Deanna Shake and Judy Grover. Would you state your name for the record, please.
Bill: This is William F. Shake. e…I was born in Macomb, Illinois on January the 20th, 1942.
Jerry: What is Macomb, Illinois like? Is that farm city?
Bill: It’s, kind of a dichotomy - it’s both a, a farming community and the home of Western Illinois University, where I went to kindergarten all the way through a master’s degree; 22 years at the same campus. iIt’s in west central Illinois about forty miles from,and equal distance from the Mississippi River and the Illinois River. It’s a very rich farming country. and it also is the home of Western Illinois University, where I went through kindergarten all the way through a master’s degree; 22 years at the same, same campus.
Jerry: (Inaudible) What got you interested in the Fish and Wildlife thingsresources?
Bill: Well I think my parents really helped me learn to enjoy the, the out doors. My, both my parents were avid fishermen 3
2
and I started it you know as soon as I was able to hold a cane pole fishing rod and when I was finally old enough, my dad would take me duck hunting. This was, even way before I could even carry a shotgun but I’d go, go out to the duck blinds with him and his friends.
Jerry: And you had to swim out for the ducks?
Bill: No, I’d (chuckling) I didn’t have to do that but I really enjoyed watching the birds and the hunting the experience and from there I just sort of progressed. We had a friend that had a cabin out on the Mississippi River and we bought a little runboat and motor about (unclear) and then I started trout line fishing on the river for catfish and catch snapping turtles and enjoyed just poking around in the marshes along the, the river. I and just had a wonderful, wonderful childhood enjoying the outer doors.
Jerry: What’d your parents do?
Bill: My father was affiliated with the Western Illinois University. He originally taught physics there and then eventually moved, as part of the facilityfaculty, moved intothen, he was in charge of the physical plant at the University so you know which included all the heating, cooling, electricityal , everything;and maintaincemaintenance work. hHe managed all of the, the folks that made the, you know, the physical plant work at the University.
run.
Jerry: Okay, so you were living a pretty good life!
Bill: Yes, we lived right across the street from the campus from, the street from the campus. I literally walked, you know, a couple blocks to school and to the University. My mom was originally a schoolteacher and then after that she had me, she was a stay at home mom.
Jerry: During those early years, as you were growing up and got into high school, did you have jobs, school, after school jobs?
Bill: I, itt seemed like I was always working. I, aAs soon as I was big enough to ride a bicycle I started delivering newspapers. I remember I had like 80 people on my newspaper route and I’d deliver papers seven days a week and I remember on the holidays you knowwhich had big sale editions on a Sunday paper; I’d have to make two or three trips with my bicycle to be able to get those papers delivered. Also, you know I worked in a grocery store, I mowed yards you knowand all the usual types of things that, that kids, types of jobs kids had back then.
Jerry: Did you have any time for hobbies?
Bill: Hunting and fishing , you knowwere my main hobbies. I was also active in Boy Scouts and I earned the Eagle Scout rank. .
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: Then mMy folks really got me started doing that; those were probably my major hobbies. I enjoyed playing with my neighbors and friends and kids.
Jerry: Let’s jump into something, you mentioned, that you went to Western Illinois University.
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: And yYou said you had (inaudible), gotrecievedreceived a masters degree. What year were your degrees? And what was your major?
Bill: I majored in Zoology. T and I, wethe University didn’t have a wildlife management or fisheries management curricularum, and it was either zoology, microbiology or, botany, nature. I got my Bachelors of Science in Zoology in 19’64 and I got my Masters of Science in Zoology in 19’67. I did my master thesis on a wood duck nesting study and how the impact of starlingss at that timewhich were taking over wood 4
2
duck nest boxes and really causing a lot of wood ducks to abandon their nests. and not raise broods during that particular year by taking over the box and they wanted, w
We wanted to see if they starlings were having the same affect in natural cavities in trees. so I, I spent two years, two summers gathering data and then the final year I wrote my thesis.
Jerry: (Unclear) dDid it go up to the jJournal of Wildlife Management or anything like that?
BBill: Yes it did, yeah it was published.
Jerry: Published there so…
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: …it was a good piece of work then.
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: Okay. What, sSounds like you were getting pretty well prepared if you were doing your masters on wood ducks. Was that wherewhat, led you to your first job?
Bill: Well it, yYes it was. I, I really, I knew I wanted to go to work for either the state or a federal fFish and wWildlife aAgency and back at that time Illinois had an opening,the Illinois Department of Conservation, had an opening. and I applied, and as luck would have it, and this really is was torturous fortunate that the secretary lost my application. T and they found it after they had already selected somebody. ; I found out later. But in order to cover themselves they had to go through the process of interviewing me so under the pretense that the job was still open. I went to Springfield and they interviewed me and unbeknownst to me, the guy that got the job was sitting out in the you know the foyer waiting to come in and talk to the guys that were doing the interview. So it was good news that I didn’t get hired by Illinois Department of Conservation because I wouldn’t have had the, the great career I’ve had with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. And it just happened that my, my major professor, my advisor who at that time the was Dean of graduate school, Dr. Hank Sather he knew Goodie Gordon Larson. H really, really well in Minneapolis he was Personnel Director for the rRegional oOffice in Minneapolis. He put me in contact with Goodie Mr. Larson and on April 17, I was, of 1967, I was hired on as a four 4-month temporary GS- 5 because of a job freeze for permanent hires.
Jerry: You had graduated by this time?
Bill: Yes I had graduated. So this temporary appointment was with the ADC, Animal Damage Control program, Wildlife Services at that time I think it was, and we moved to Lafayette, Indiana. and I think my annual salary at that time was less than $5,000. back in 1967.
Jerry: That would have been your GS 5 then?
Bill: A GS 5 starting out and sSo I did my four4-month assignment and the job freeze or whatever you know ended. I was able to resign from that position and then they picked me up the very next day as a permanent, full-time employee.
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: And bBecause I had my masters degree I was eligible for a GS- 7, so I got a raise.
Jerry: Were you able to avoid the military? or did you…
Bill: No. I… went up to Chicago, back when we had draft cards, and I had to go up for a physical. And I’ve always had a high blood pressure problem. A, as a kid I couldn’t play football in high school because of my blood pressure but I could play basketball; I never did understand that, but anyway I went up to Chicago., wWhen they checked my blood pressure it was high so the procedure was they put you up in a room overnight and took take your blood pressure twice. then tThe next and day it was still high so they gave me a 1-Y status on my draft card, which means if they go to war and they really need a warm body they would of drafted me but otherwise I didn’t get drafted. I and was able to complete college and, and go right to work for the Service.
Jerry: Deanna is with us today. When does she come into the picture?
5
2
Bill: Well she and her brother and their folks moved to Macomb probably when I was a high school semaphoresophmoresophomore, freshman.
Deanna: You were a Junior.
Bill: She’s telling me when I was a junior twhen they moved here.
Deanna: OH!
Bill: No, no they moved to Macomb before that.
Deanna: I moved when I was in 7th grade.
Bill: Yes, so Deanna was in 7th grade when she moved there and I was two years ahead of her in school. And her brother and I were in the same grade and so I always walked to school with him and Deanna. B (someone saying something in background) being the little sister, she would always walk up ahead of us and you know like I said it was only a couple blocks to the school and you know she was really attractive (unclear, chuckling) in 7th grade, I thought she was pretty. (inaudible). But aA year or so later I, I did ask her to go out and her folks asked their son, my friend Ron, you know what kind of guy I was and he gave me a glowing report and so I was able to take Deanna out on our first dDate and… a long story short we’ve been going together and had been married for 46 years.
Jerry: Been a long time and been married and yYou had children, I take it.
Bill: We have two daughters; Chantal Shantel and Jennifer, both of those girls were born after we were transferred up to Lansing, Michigan.
Jerry: The daughters are on the west coast now?
Bill: Yes Chantal Shantel lives here in Portland and Jennifer lives up in a suburb near SalemSeattle.
Deanna: Seattle.
Bill: Or Seattle I mean, I’m sorry.
Jerry: Okay. Let’s, let’s take a jump back to start on your career now. You got have your temporary appointment; you now have been hired as a GS- 7 Biologist in Region 3. in Minneapolis office. What was that job?
Bill: It was a, I was field biologist with Wildlife ServicesAnimal Damage Control and basically what we were doing is when people were having problems with depredating birds or, or voles in apple orchards, roosting birds you know in cities or whatever, they would, would call our office. and wWe’d come out and provide assistance on showing folks how to, how to reduce the, the affects of the animals; whether they’re groundhogs and (someone speaking in background)in pastures or you know blackbirds birds eating corn , or eating fruit off of commercially grown fruittrees
.
Jerry: In other words as a biologist you are now all of a sudden your killing things.
Bill: That’s correct. We were, we were quite good at it actually.
Jerry: And the division you were a wildlife biologist, wWhat was the division? It was Predator and Rodent Control that then they went to Animal …Jerry and Bill: …Damage Control and then they went to…
Bill: …Wildlife …Services!
Jerry and Bill: …Services.
Jerry: And you started out…
Bill: Then back to ADC, I think it was…
Jerry: Animal Damage…
Bill: I think it was Animal Damage Control when I…
Jerry: (inaudible, speaking at same time). That’s when the federal government had taken on…
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …The Service waswe were doing coyotes in other parts of the country. But you were working primarily on bird depredation?
Bill: Yeah eExactly.
Jerry: But you were, you would sayworking primarily on bird depredation? Which is… 6
2
Bill: Yeah we,Yes cCoyotes hadn’t become really a problem in the mid-west like they are now. I know Tthey’re more, certainly more prevalent now thaen they were when I was a field biologist. then but wWe dealt mostly with rodent control,and bird control. things like that. We even had a program, at that time, where we would, cities would or municipalities, counties would call us that if they had landfills and if theythat were overrun with rats. and wWe would go out and make a survey of the dump the at night before and, you know with flashlights, and count the number of rats we’d see. and tThen we’d go buy cases of canned dog food and mix up the dog food with a chemical called zinc phosphide. and then wWe’d go out with these buckets of this mixture and we’d plop it all around the dump. And then we’d come back to the dump about three or four days later do another survey to see how effective we were. And…
Jerry: Were you?
Bill: We were.
Jerry: Who was your first boss?
Bill: My first boss was Fred QuartzelCourtsel; he was athe sState sSupervisor in Lafayette, Indiana. We also hasd a bait station at Lafayette where we mixed up lots of thesebait compounds and then supplyied those it to county extension agents and, to other wWildlife sWServices offices around the country. So it was kind of a, you know,a combination field office and a bait station.
Jerry: How long were you at Lafayette then?
Bill: Ten months.
Jerry: Ten months, tThen what happened?
Bill: Well I had been assigned to over to Ohio and to help out the Wildlife Service’s Office over there do some corn depredation surveys up on Lake Erie. And aAt the time Dick Smith was the State Supervisor at Columbus and so I went over there for several weeks and, and did corn damage assessments. W and then when I got back from that, and this was in the late summer/fall, and when I got back from that assignment I got a call to come over to Columbus. and I took Deanna with me and walked into Dick Smith’s office. Before we saw Dick the secretary said, “Oh you must be the new person going to Lansing, Michigan.” Well this was all news to me. So she kind of let the cat out of the bag.
but…
Jerry: What year was this?
Bill: That would be 1968.
Jerry: ’68.
Bill: So, you knowI, talked to Dick, and he offered me the job as Assistant State Supervisor in Lansing, Michigan. and iIt was a one person station and then I’d be in charge of all the ADC work in, in Lansing and I remember…Michigan.
Jerry: Did you get a promotion?
Bill: Yes I got arecievedreceived a GS 9 out of thatpromotion to GS-9. We went out to Dick’s house for lunch and Dick put the sale on, ontalked to Deanna about moving to Lansing. and we lived in, iIn Lafayette we lived in this this one hundred year old… farmhouse and it was on about 360 acres and it was great; had a small mouth bass stream in the back yard and pheasants and quail you know and it was pretty nice. We raised bird dogs at the time and so it, we really enjoyed Lafayette. B but Michigan was, waswas also a really a nice place to live as well so.
Jerry: WOkay again, what was your, what were your daily activities? You’re a one-man office.
Bill: We worked a lot up there with orchardists, either blueberry growers orin their apple orchards showing them how to control voles, which would you know girdle the fruit trees. Some of the species of voles would actually eat the roots and really reduce the vitality of those trees and the amount of fruit 7
2
that they could produce. and of course tThe birds physically were causing damage and also lo loss to cherries, and blueberries. So we were working, we did a lot of work with the Service’s Denver Research Lab. and tThey had a bird group out there, a bird depredation group and so we would run a lot of field tests using various noise makers, using spray- on repellants and of things like that to …ssee if we could finds ways to, to reduce the depredation.
We also , in Michigan, gotwere involved with an endangered species - issues the Kirtland’s warble warbler. They only nest, only in jack pine stands in central Michigan, north central Michigan. And tTheir habitat tree age was really specific it would beand the birds would only nest in stands that were only seven to fifteen, seventeen years old. and fFire was the you know the you know the regenerative factor for these, these habitats. and a lot of it was on a national guard base. The birds were, were not doing well at all there’s just you knowwith the population level down to a few hundred birds I mean less than like two or three hundred. I think, if I remember right. And we found out if you; they were having problemsThe reason for the decline was with cowbird parasitism. where The cowbirds would lay an egg or two in the Kirtland’s warblers nest, they were a ground nesting bird, and then the of course the cowbird fledgling nestling would take over the nest and, and eat all the food and the Kirtland’s nestlings wouldn’t make it. And so this was a big reason why they were, were not doing well. So wWe found outdiscovered that if you trap the cow birds that we could significantly increase the, the fledgling rate for Kirtland’s,. significantly, really significantly. And so wWe set up a big cowbird trapping program in Michigan and the nesting habitat. ; we’d We would do breeding birdgo out surveys for the birds every spring and then we’d, we’d set up traps, decoy traps. where you’d have you know We would getcatch some black birds to act as decoys to attract the cowbirds in to the trap. and, and we, wWe killed hundreds and hundreds of cowbirds every year. And This program really put the Kirtland’s warbler back on the track to you know sustainability. and, and survival so that was a, you know, a major accomplishment.Currently there are over 1,700 Kirktland’s Warblers. Three of us wrote a publication, wrote a paper and it was published in a Michigan scientific journal called the, The Kirtland’s Warbler of all things. But anyway that was one activity, Jerry, of many.I was also the leader of the Recovery Team who wrote the Recovery Plan for the species.
This program was a very rewarding activity.
Jerry: It sounds like your tying, in Lansing (inaudible) you were doing a lot of educating of the farmers as on to how to control animal problems rather than physically hands on. Were you providing them , what kind ofwith tools, were youand giving them; was the government giving away poison or traps?
Bill: Well we would, we would give them some , you knowbaits like zinc phosphide grain to treat orchards for voles., the mouse/vole control, but wWe would’d also; we show them how to use it safely. T and thhen they would be able to order this the bait through their county extension agent.
where they could order the, the products and, and use those to reduce you know the damage.
Jerry: Given today’s views on things, was zinc phosphide, is that a pretty hot item? What about secondary poisonings?
Bill: It, it really didn’t have the secondary affect. I’m sure that non-target rodents , you know, I’m sure itwere affected. , them. I don’t know if it’s registered today and whether they’re still using it or not. We did have applications where you would put the treated grain underground., Wwe’d have like a littleto, make a little furrow burrow and actually it’s almost like; it’s an artificial tunnel along the drip lines of the trees. T and then the voles would get in and use those tunnels and it’d drop treated grain.
And at the time I mean wWe also used strychnine back you know in those days. wWe would use strychnine treated baits in certain applications and certainly that’s a chemical that’s not going tonna be specific. to, to anything; like if you’re using We would use strychnine treated eggs for predator control like where skunks were preying on pheasant nests. or whatever, tThere’s a long story about Dick Smith and the Congressman’s 8
2
dog. where theyDick was were doing predator control on a wildlife management area on an Kelly’s island out in Lake Erie, Kelly’s Island. And tThey put these dummy nests out would have fakewith strychnine treated eggs. and they had, place was beingThe island was overrun by skunks and it was a popular pheasant hunting area area.out in Ohio. The skunks were eating all of the pheasant eggs. So Dick and his crew had put out these dummy nests,. T they ’rewere all well marked with (inaudible) and everything.so that the public would not disturb them.
Jerry: This Dick Smith was your supervisor? was your supervisor still?
Bill: Yes he was my boss at the time. And long story short, a crow picked up one of these strychnine treated eggs and was flying over this a Congressman’s summer home. Something startled the crow, this is what we suspect happened. I it’s the only way that we can think that this thing happened. The crow Ddropped the egg in the Congressman’s front yard, his golden retriever ran down and promptly ate the egg. And by the time he got up to the front porch it went into throws of death and in front of the kids and everything else. And so heThe Congressman found out about the program and called the went back got hold of acting Regional Director found out what was going on and pretty much and wanted him to fire Dick Smith. but did not have that, make that occur but iIt took a little bitlot of explaining to convince folks the Congressman that we were certainly acting within the , the precautions that you knowprotocallsprotocols and procedures that we’d are set out for using those kinds of thingsthose types of programs.
.
Jerry: Okay. How long were you at Lansing then?
Bill: I was there seven years.
Jerry: Seven years.
Bill: Mm-uh
Jerry: Where did you go after Lansing?
Bill: After Lansing I moved up to the Regional Office as a staff biologist with Animal Damage Control. or maybe at that time Wildlife Services. Wes Jones was my immediate supervisor in the Regional Office and Jack Hemphill was the Regional Director; Dale (unsure of last name)Del Rassmusen was also up there as Assistant orthe Regional Supervisor of the Endangered Species program and Federal Aid.. So Deanna and I and Shan and Jennifer lived in an apartment in Hudson, Wisconsin.
for…let’s see Endangered Species I guess it was in Minneapolis. So anyway I was in the staff biologist position for ADC under Wes Jones for a year and then Jim Engel, who was the senior staff biologist for the Endangered Species Program, he had a detail back in D.C. I think it was and so I moved over and was acting Endangered Species Biologist in, for the, you know, for another year. W while I was there . Aand workeding for Dale RaspitsonDel Rassmusen, at that time. And after that Jack Hemphill nominated me and encouraged me to apply and then nominated me for the dDepartmental’s mManagement dDevelopment training pProgram, (DMDP) in Washington, D.C.
Program.
Jerry: What grade were you now at this time?
Bill: I think…I think I was a GS- 12 maybe a, when I got to D.Cwas with Animal Damage Control and as. I was a GS- 13. So I don’t know, I must have gotten a 13 when I was acting you know as the Endangered Species Senior Biologistone of the senior Biologist for Endangered Species. So Deanna and I and the kids well we had, back in Michigan we had the two daughters Chan Shan and Jennifer lived in an apartment in Hudson, Wisconsin..
Jerry: They’d come along by this time.
Bill: Yesah.They were born in Lansing And so we, we left Minnesota and took off and drove.
Jerry: Minnesota, Lansing.
Bill: Drove out to…
Jerry: Michigan.
Bill: …to well no we’re in the Regional Office.
(Speaking at same time) 9
2
Jerry: Oh okay you’re in the Regional Office.
Bill: Yeah, Yeah.
Jerry: I’m sorry.
(End speaking at same time)
Bill: So we left, we left Minneapolis and we lived in Hudson, which is just across the River, a lot of the folks from the Regional Office they lived in Hudson. Anyway we took off and went to,drove to D.C. W we found a townhouse in Reston, Virginia VVirginia .and joined the, the car poolers and all the traffic heading into D.C.. and that would be we moved to D.C. in 1977 I think it was; ’1977, and ’1978 was the, the firstwere the two years of the DMDP Program. and The programthat was just really a fabulous experience for me and for the family too,. W we really enjoyed our time in D.C.
The Department Program,T the first ten months of the program consisted of training sessions and internships on Capitol Hill, the private sector, other Government agencies and your imagination is your only limitation. and what kind of assignments that you can have. I spent four months of the ten months working for a Congressmen from Minnesota, Jim Oberstar who’s still a member of Congress now. At that time ANILCA, the Alaska Lands Legislation, was going through Congress and he basically handed me all of the briefing materials that the dDepartment of the Interior was providing the members of Congress and t on the, the committee that was handling this legislation. and I became his staff person for that and it was fun to prepare him for hearings. and Bill Bob Herbst at that time was Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks. And so here ’is, you know, the Assistant Secretary and here I am a GS- 13 sitting behind a Congressmen writing questions for him to ask the Assistant Secretary so it was kind of a heady atmosphere really. And tThe legislation did pass.;
I had other a good assignments one with The Defenders of Wildlife,…which one was it, it was a group that opposed Animal Damage Control. but I wanted to go over and see what, where they were coming from.
And I can’t, I’m drawing a blank right now Jerry I can’t remember what.
Jerry: Okay. Let’s step back a minute, let’s step back a minute Bill. Let’s go back to your days in East Lansing and then the Minneapolis and then your move on there. What was your quality of life like? You obviously, you were went from a 9 to an 11, 12 then you were a 13 when you went to D.C.
Bill: Yeah I was an GS-11 I think in Lansing. I don’t know if I got a 12 there or not I can’t remember. But we started out with a small house that we rented in a really nice neighborhood; Bill (unsure of last name)Fuchs was the sSenior Law Enforcement aAgent for , you know,the Fish and Wildlife Service in Lansing and he lived two doors down from us. W and we became good friends with he and his wife. We made a lot of really good friends in Michigan. , a lot of really good friends and Deanna was busy being a mom you know with two , you know, toddlers and newborns and toddlers. And so you know I think it was, we did really well,. W we were able to save up our money and, and we bought our first house in Lansing. And you know sold it eventually when we moved on to, to Minneapolis; we didn’t buy in Minneapolis cuz because we didn’t know how long we were going to be there so we rented an apartment. And stayed there, iIn fact I went up to Minneapolis before Deanna and stayed up there for several months and thenbefore she came up with the kids and we lived in an apartment.
Jerry: Then you went on to D.C. Did you rent there as well?
Bill: No we bought, we bought a townhouse in Reston and Iwe did, did well when we sold it. W, we made some money on that, that house although it took a long time to sell but.
Jerry: What else did you do on your DMDP Program; you said you had the (inaudible, speaking at same time).
Bill: I’ll maybe think of it here in a little bit. But I…
Jerry: But you were on the ten-month program?
Bill: No, Yeah well iIit was a two year program. but, but…I worked for Jack Berryman in Animal Damage Control. , hHe 10
2
was the Chief of ADC and I helped him set up a , he started, became a, started a new office in Washington. Aand so I helped him get that all set up and at the end of that he asked me if I wanted , you know, to come to the, his, the Washington office and work on his staff. and I told thanked him for his offer but declined.I didn’t think so you know
I spent five and a half years in D.C. Other assignments included shadowed shadowing Director Lynn Greenwalt. Then I after I , youalso had regular training classes. you had to go to. Then aAfter I finished my ten-month Programs then you, youI still needed to stay another fourteen months before your my tour was officially up and, and. A at that time the Alaska Lands Legislation, ANILCA, had passed and the Bob Herbst had assigned Dick Myshak who was Deputy Assistant Secretary with the task of putting together a group of staffers. They would come from the Bureau of Outdoor Recreation, which is no longer, and, is no longer a Bureau in Interior, and the Park Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service, to began developing plans for implementing ANILCA. And so we spent….
Jerry: DIA BIA wasn’t included in this?
Bill: No it was not. We had two Fish and Wildlife Service folks, myself and Gary Burke. And a pPark sService representative and a BOR representative and so our job was to go through the legislation and figure out, you know, what the implementation plans, you know, what were needed to be developed.; Wwe worked with the Bureaus and our respected Directors to get you knowthe plans put together., wWe’d traveled up to Alaska on two or three occasions. We would provide briefings for the Assistant Secretary and then we’dto go over to the White House and brief the CEQ, Council of Environmentally Quality. , Director on progress. you know Secretary, Assistant Secretary Herbst would go over and we’d prepare all the briefing material for him. and These briefings werewas funny because one of my DMDP best buddies was working,, (this was during the Carter Administration), working for the CEQ Director. and sSo here we’d be in the Roosevelt room in the White House and he’s sitting with his boss and it was Stu Eisentadt. .was this guy’s name. And Bob Herbst and I would be on the otheron one end of table. and Stu Eisentadt on the other end of the table and then my buddy sitting next to him and me sitting next to Bob and I’d go over to the White House and we’d have lunch you know in the White House cafeteria and when the President wasn’t there. , yYou couldn’t do it today, but we’d go in the oval office and wonder walk around and it was, it was a pretty neat assignment, I really enjoyed it. So I did that and then…I went down, aAfter I completed my DMDP work, , then Ed Verburg hired me down in the Division of Program Plans. . And Ed worked for Dan Sokolowski who worked for Mike Spear at that time. And our, oOur assignment was we had a group to develop a Service Management Plan and Regional Resource Planning Guidelines and then from there we helped the Regions develop Regional Resource.
Plans so that took up…
Jerry: By this time, after you had done completed your basically your twenty-four months at DMDP, you were now in at some kind of permanent position as a biologist or administrator?
Bill: I was a staff person, a.
Jerry: You’re staff, staff biologist .
Bill: Mm-huhYes in the Division of Program Plans. I wasn’t using much biological...you know pure biological input into my staff positions it was more of a planning effort but, but having the biological background certainly you know helped you know understand what the Service was about and, and make sure the, the development of these Service Plans , you know, were biologicalybiologically based.
Jerry: Okay so you’re, in the Division of Program Plans right now, Ed Verburg your boss working on the (unclear)SMP and RRP’s. I and, and is it true , I guess it’s understanding on whythat you have those two documents on your beside table.
Bill: (Laughing) Well, they’ve, they’ve been relegated to a prominent position in my garage right now. I, I do still have 11
2
them actually. They’re probably collector’s items. M, maybe I outta should donate those to the archives or whateverNCTC. It wasn’t, it was really a good idea and Mike Spear was the person responsible for Program Management and it turned the Service in a different direction in terms of how you think about budgeting and, and evaluating you know how well we were doing. and Mike wasn’t the most popular guy; but he’s probably one of the brightest guys that the Service, you know, has ever employed.
but you know the Service forever had been doing things the way they always did. And Mike…
Jerry: And so this was more than just an exercise, this did have a lasting effect.
Bill: Absolutely!.
Jerry: And it had a positive effect on how the Service did business?
.
Bill: Well I think it did, but not everybody (inaudible speaking at same time).felt that way.
Jerry: Looking back.
Bill: Yeah, yeah Yes not everybody did Bbut I mean we needed to get into the 20th century and start you know being more competitive for budgets and everything else and, and that was you know Mike and Lynn Greenwalt’s objectives. was toThey wanted , to turn that corner and get the Service, you know, being more competitive up on the hill for, for scarce budget dollars. like they always are. So it was, iIt was a turning point -, that’s a good, good way to put it! Jerry, that’s where the Service started began and off and, and continuesd to this day: you know using that the same program management system, in terms of budgeting. And as I understand it, the Service, you know, I guess there maybe are no new ideas but some folks have been telling me that, that some of the, the things that we did back in the development of the Service Management Plan and Region Regional Resource Plans; they’re starting toare being revisited those, because tthose processes again because they were biologically based and, and had goals and objectives that you could measure.
Jerry: So the success there was the process that was used…
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …to develop?
Bill: Exactly!, exactly.
Jerry: So you were, you spent another three years in D.C. How did you get out of D.C.?
Bill: Well like tThe Service always is they had a huge reorganization and they went fromthey just closed the aArea oOffices, and went back to a Regional Office management profile. see I spent, tThe whole time the Service went into thathad aArea oOffices, phase I was back in D.C. so I wasn’t affected by that at allthe closures. . But, but you know as you know Jerry, you were in an area office.
Jerry: Yeah, but when I went to DMDP my training was leading to the area offices concept of management you know, being prepared for …
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …tthe new Region 6, which came on board and was to lead the way.
Bill: Right, right. Well so I was, I was, while that was all going on you know we were busy doing, developing our Service plans and then the process the plans that were the, the Regional ResourceArea Office Plansclosures. And so the, the Director decided, Director Greenwalt againand, the Directorate decided that they were going to get rid ofclose the aArea oOffices and that they were going to go back to the traditional pProgram Assistant Regional Directors; with Program and line management authority. I mean they had Assistant Regional Directors in the Regional Offices that were in charge of (inaudible) out the money but for the issue management the area office (inaudible, speaking at same time) they did operations. And they were fighting you know in some Regions 12
2
all the time because one guy controlled the funds and the other guy, you know, he’s got…
Jerry: (Inaudible)
Bill: …all the, yeah he’s got all the problems out there and, and he kind of thinks he knows where the money outta be spent, so there’s sort of a natural conflict I think in that approach so Greenwalt and the Directorate decided to move back to, to strictly program management and Assistant Regional Directors for programsAAfter the decisio0n was made to close Area Offices the Service advertised all of the Regional Assistant Regional DirectorR positions. If you were a ARD in the Region you had to apply for your job and if you applied for one job in a region you applied for all of the similar jobs in all of the Regions. So they the Directorate had what we called “The NFL Draft” and this would have been back in 1982, ’81 or ’82. And they, everybody had to apply that abolished area offices and everybody, tThe jobs were wide open. All the Assistant Regional Directors jobs for all the programs; Endangered Species, Refuges, Fisheries, . Did I sayand Ecological Services.?
Jerry: No.
Bill: Ecological Services. See they had two separate ones, Endangered Species and, and a…
Jerry: Habitat Conservation.Bill: Yeah. Ecological Services so there were…and tThe administrative ARD’s their jobs stayed remained in place the same because you know they weren’t duplicated (inaudible) to give out.there wasn’t a large AministrativeAdministrative presence in the Area Offices.
Jerry: Didn’t have a big admen presence in the area offices…
Bill: No, no.
Jerry: …it was program people; I was one of those that was in that draft, and had to applyedapplied for something or another.those positions but I was only eligible as a GS-13 without a promotion. There were too many GS-14’s that had to find a home for me to get promoted at that time
Bill: So, so…
Jerry: (Inaudible, speaking at same time)
Bill: …if you apply for one but tThe rules were that if you apply for one, you apply for all. So I, I applied for the Endangered Species jobs and I applied, which was were GS-a14 , and thenwhile all the others were GS-15’s; I don’t know if I was eligible. I don’t remember if I was a 14 when I left, I don’t think I was. But, so I applied for the Endangered Species jobs and I remember going, Dick Smith was or not Dick Smith buttalking to Dick Myshak, the Regional Director in Portland.was the Assistant Regional Director out here at the time and I’d known Dick you knowand I’d worked for him when I, when we did all the Alaska planning; Dick was our immediate boss. And so I called Dick up, here in Portland, and I said, “Well what do you think? ,” you know, “Sshould I apply for these things jobs or not?” And he said, “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” And he still remembers that to this day and I said, “Well you’re right.”. So I applied. And long story short the Directorate met for this big NFL Draft and they had a matrix up here with all the Regions and then the four or five jobs you know along one axis and, and started with Regions 1 thru 7. and so they; tThe first question one of the Assistant Regional Directors or Regional Directors asked was, Lynn Greenwalt, “Is Washington Ooffice experience required to fill these positions?” And he said, “Yes, absolutely.!” And then the second one question was, “Well where” you know “What region are we going to start with?” And Lynn Greenwalt said, “Region 1.”
Well aAs it turned out…Dick Myshak, Ed Chamberland was the Assistant Regional Director out here for Endangered Species and Federal Aid. And that was Dick’s first choice but Ed had never been to Washington, he’d been, he’d worked with Florida Fish and Game and then come to the Service; fine, fine gentlemen and very capable individual. Well the good news is was, I was Dick Myshak’s second choice and so he took me for that position. and had it gone the other way, Howard Larson in Boston, I found out later, I was Howard’s first choice. So if they had started with 7, they had gotten to and worked backwards that I’dIRegion 5 I would have g gone to Boston instead of Portland. so itI was very fortuitous and that’s how I, I made the break; five and half years in D.C. it was a wonderful 13
2
experience. Would I want to go back and do it again? No, I was ready to come out andmove out of D.C.… I ’dhad never been to Portland before ‘tiluntil I came out, Deanna and I came out for a house-hunting trip. I’d been to Seattle for the World’s Fair back in ’60s something whenever the World’s fair was back in Seattle. But, sSo we packed up and came across country. In
Jerry: Okay so.
Bill: 1982.
Jerry: 1982 you packed up and came across country.
Bill: Pulled into Portland at…well tThe night before we got to Portland we stayed in Walla Walla, Washington, and I mean at that time it was , it’s really, you know, grown a lot now but back then it wasa pretty seedy town. And the girls, when we got back into the car and were on our way to Portland, they said “Boy we sure hope that Portland doesn’t look like Walla Walla, Washington.” And so no and it didn’t. But driving (inaudible) you knowthrough the Columbia River Gorge for the first time and all of that is justwas absolutely spectacular. And we got here and On my first day in the Regional Office,the first thing Dick Myshak did was taketook me over to Ed Chamberland’s office and kind of literally pushed me in his office and said, “Here’s the guy that’s taken over your job”. “You and hetwo figure out ”, you know, “how we can use him here in the Regional Office.” And then he left. Well that was kind of a harsh way to get started but Ed was fine. W we worked out a deal with Larry Debates, was the …ARD for RegugesRefuges.
Jerry: Refuge.
Bill: Refuge ARD so heLarry offered Ed the Assistant or AR, Assistant ARD job and that worked out really well for him, for both of ‘em.them. And Wally Steucke was Fisheries ARD and Joe Blum was the Ecological Services ARD at the time and Dick Myshak was the ARD Regional Director and Bill Meyer was the Deputy Regional Director. Jerry VanMeter, at that time was the Assistant Regional Director for Administration.
. So.
Jerry: So now your career is beginning in E, in Endangered Species; SE was the designation as opposed to ES. …
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …designation as opposed to ES.
Bill:
Right and iIt was really interesting that all of the ARD positions were GS- 15’s except the Endangered Species positions, which were all GS-14’s. And aAt that time ESA was just starting to rear it’s ugly head in terms of the volume of work and everything else in the, the, the toll it was going to extract from the Fish and Wildlife Service in terms of dealing with all the ESA issues. And it, that, tThe reason they did thatgraded out as a 14 was I think we still, we had some kind of cap on number of 15’s and whoever was the head personnel guy back in D.C. thought this was one way to prevent grade creep. you know thisHe believed the ESA Endangered Species thing wasn’t that big of a deal so we’re just makeing them 14’s. . So eEventually they figured it out and made them 15’s.
.
Jerry: When they did though, didn’t they merge Ecological Services and Endangered Species into one program? …
Bill: They merged at…
Jerry: …Ecological Services…
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: … and Endangered Species into one program…
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …calledRenamed it Habitat Conservation.
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: And that was at the GS- 15 15 level.(inaudible)?
Bill: YeahYes, see that’s, that’s what happened.
Jerry: But with reorganization there were The two Deputy GS-14’s.
Bill: Right. So, you know, and I; boy I went through so many reorganizations here I don’t even know how to try to begin to capture all of that and what happened.
Jerry: Okay now we’re talking 1982.
Bill: 82. 14
2
Jerry: That was the end of the, demise of the, of the Area Offices.
Bill: Mm-huh.yes
Jerry: Okay and…
Bill: T And most, I mean no surprise, I mean tThehe Pacific rRegion still included you know California and Hawaii and, and Nevada and our (inaudible) heremost of our ESA issues were down in California and in Nevada. While I was Endangered Species ARD we established Ash Meadow Refuge for Desert Pup fish down in, near Las Vegas.
We didhad, another accomplishment under, with Dick Myshak’s leadership.you know leadership, wWe wrote negotiated the first two ever hHabitat cConservation pPlans (HCPs) developed under the Endangered Species Act, the provisions in the Endangered Species Act. The first one was in on San Bruno Mountain in San Francisco, California. ; wWhen you land at the San Francisco aAirport there you’ll see San Bruno Mountain off to the west and two-thirds of that mountain has been set aside for butterfly habitat and the rest then was available for developers and that was the first, for development, housing development. and tThat was the first hHabitat cConservation pPClan that was, was completed.
And tThe second one was down innear Palm Springs in the Coachella Valley where we established a conservation planHCP there for the Coachella Valley French Fringed-toedtoad lizard. D and desert habitat was set aside ;because it was being threatened by development. And soWe went through all the biological analysis, figured out what the lizard’s needed and set that aside and set up a mechanism for funding it into perpetuity and then the development could progress.
Jerry: Bill (inaudible) take a minute, time out. here. Okay, sounds like you’re a pretty busy guy. What kind of staff did you have in Portland? And the next question I’m going to lead, how did you interact with the staff that was in the field? What was your role? You were the chief ARD of the Endangered Species Program in Portland.
Bill: I was the ARD.
Jerry: Or ARD, okay. And hHow many bodies did you have to help you do all this?
Bill: : [Sounds like tape turning back on] (We recording now?) Okay the staff that, tthat we had for Endangered Species I think I had…maybe six people.; Sandy Wilbur was the cChief of Endangered Species for me. Wayne White worked there ,…Martha Huagn, no not Martha Huagn oh what’s her name she went to beingwe had a botanist, , she went to Alaska we hadand Robyn Thorson, the current Region 1 Regional Director, also worked on our staff.
…
Jerry: Okay ‘about, you had about six bodies.
Bill: About six people, yeah yes so it was prettya, pretty you know small, small staff.
Jerry: But we the Region still had field offices, wasn’t down, you weren’t.
down in…
Bill: We had an office in Sacramento. and
Jerry: And we had one in southern California at…
Bill: We did at…Ventura I think.
[Small break in tape]
Jerry: We’re back on. What was your relationship with these offices? You had one in Sacramento and then we eventually ended up with one in Carlsbad .
Bill: Mm-huhYes. And we had another office in…in Reno.
Jerry: In Reno.
Bill: And we had an office in Olympia, . And we had one herein Portland, the field office here in Portland.
Jerry: Aand Boise.
.
Bill: And Boise. And tThe relationship waswe had with the field was that …I think the Endangered or the Ecological Services folks directly supervised whoever was in charge of those offices but, but I remember Gail Kobetich I’m pretty sure he worked for me. So we did have a relationship you know 15
2
with the supervisor relationship with some of the field offices. I know the Sacramento the one we did.
Jerry: Okay.
Bill:
We controlledalloctedallocated of the, the money for the, field offices and wrote the budgets and plans, you know, the whatever kind ofor thef program plans.
Jerry: Okay.
[Speaking at same time, inaudible]
Jerry: The listing packages were written at the field level?
…
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: …and viewedAnd reviewed byat whom?…
Bill: Yes, yeah.
Jerry: …at the Regional Office Level.
Bill: They came up here for final review and the RD’s signature and then were sent to the Washington Office for the Director’s approval.
Jerry: So they had staff like at Sacramento.
Bill: They did. They did in fact they had you know pretty good size staff because of the number of issues that they were, were working on. I remember one time going down there after the aArea oOffices closed and Gail Kobetich (inaudible) he and I was were sitting on an airplane and he said, “Man what am I going to do without Bill Sweeney” you know
“being my area manager?” And I said, “Well you’re going to be a supervisor of ...” [Phone ringing, stop in tape]
the California Endangered Species program.
End of Side 1, start of side 2 (picks up with Jerry speaking)
Jerry: …Reorganization seems to be the word asfor the ARD for Endangered Species then what happened?
Bill:
Well I hope I can get this chronologically correct. What happened was tThey combined the Endangered Species and Ecological Services functions. And at, bBy that time Dave Riley was now out here as the ARD for Endangered Species or I mean Ecological Services. in Portland. And so that left two guys for one job., M me still at a GS-14 and Dave at a GS-15. So I became Dave’s assistant for a while. and aAlso, at the same time in the Fisheries Program, Fred Vincent, who was Wally Steucke’s Deputy ARD, he was retiring. and retired. And sSoo then the plan was for me to I moved over over into Fred’s position and Wally was gonna going be soon to be retired, you know, a year or two later. I think is the way the sequence of that, maybe a year. So they were gonna try to set me up to be able get theI could apply for the ARD for Fisheries job at a 15. So when Fred retired and Wally picked me for the Deputy Fisheries position and I moved over to Fisheries. and then Wally retired and ultimately, then I became ARD for Fisheries.
Jerry: And this was your first branch into Fisheries ands here- to-fore before you’ve been either in Wildlife or Planning.
Bill: Right, right.!. And, you know, I, I’d never taken a Fisheries course in college but man if there’s a fish out there I’d love to catch it. a nd I really like fish and I and understand fish habitat and had become a crazy salmon fishermen and steelhead fishermen. and, and I was really excited about going to, to work in, in Fisheries. And…it was, iIt was really, really exciting, and challenging. W; we had so many good people working in the Regional Office there.and Wwe had fabulous folks out in the field and hatchery managers and it just; it was a really exciting times, for me.
Jerry: Okay now we’re somewhere, what year are we talking about? 19’87?
Bill: Probably
Jerry: Because see I was back in D.C. at that time and I was just coming out of D.C. and came back to the, back to the Region.
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …Fisheries.
Bill: Right.
Jerry: All this was going on while I was back there. 16
2
Bill: Yep.
Jerry: Okay, so now we’re, here we are trucking down the Fisheries Program before listings.
Bill: Well, I mean (little chuckle).,
Jerry: Before listings…
Bill: Yeah Yyes before , beforeESA listing of Pacific Salmon stocks.
Jerry: But the Region had water issues,and Indian issues.
Bill: Oh the Columbia, and I mean the Sacramento River, water issues were huge! you know wWe were working that both of the issues withon the Ecological Services side with a lot of fisheries input.; Marty (unsure of last name)Jelson’s sp?Kjelson’s his office in Stockton was collecting all the data , for the Central Valley water issues. tThe Fisheries Assistant Office , was collecting all the ddata that was used by all of the agencies and water users. thThe agencies down therein California were using to trying to manage that system to protect the aquatic habitats and Marty was just a key player. in all of that, aA lot of times they didn’t like the information that he was providing… but it was good science.
Jerry: Well.
Bill: …tThe science is a science.
Jerry: Yes it (or he) was; he’s one of the best pure scientists I think the Service had.
Bill: That’s right and you had the wonderful opportunity of supervising Marty and, and working on those issues. We had Jim Morin Warren we were really blessed with Jim Morin, one of the best fish health guys in the Service. and had him andOur hatcheries went through some pretty insignificant disease outbreaks, new diseases that we’ve had not , you know, hadhad been found in hatcheries. In one case Wwe, we wound up killing all the fish at McCall Makah Hatchery on the Indian reservation in Washington, I think.. Were you here Jerry when we did that?
Jerry: No, I was in D.C. I was the one that had to sign off on that. I had to go over to CEQ and tell them why we’re you were going to kill all these fish.
Bill: Yeah I know.
Jerry: And then also we did in a year class at Spring Creek on the Columbia River.
Bill: What was the disease, V, VHS?
Jerry: Viral Hemorrhagic Septicemia.
Bill: Right, right. . And boy that was, I mean Jim really helped me us work these difficult decisions. He helped develop and it also, the fact that we had really good policies. that these folks, there was He led a, athe establishment of a fish health group in the Northwest that Jim helped to established. Aand they had developed a set of procedures and guidelines for inin the event something like this would, would show up. And, you know, it was not an easy decision, it wasn’t a popular decision with the tribes or with even our own biologists.
Jerry: (Inaudible, speaking at same time) oObliviously the ocean, ocean commercial and the inland sports. anglers did not like this decision either.
Bill: Exactly, exactly..
Jerry: You I know but beingthat we were busy but all of a sunddensudden weall that then all a sudden you had had a new piece of legislation called the Climate KalmathKlamath River Fish and Wildlife Restoration Act. We opened a Nnew office , new emphasis onto work on … implementing the Act.
Bill: Yes, sirwe did .and Well you, you helped open that office and…
Jerry: Well I did was,and I helped do work on theat legislation in D.C.
Bill: Right., right. 17
2
Jerry: Then turned around andI was reassigned out here and ended up putting that office together. …
Bill: YeahYes.
Jerry: …aAAnd you would be the Secretary’s representative on the Kalamath River Management Council;.
Bill: Right! It was and one of my fond memories really of putting that whole program together and establishing the KalamathKlamath River Task Force. The challenge of and trying to developing a management plan for the Klamath Basin that had input from the commercial fisherman,and to recreational fishermen, the tribes, three different tribes, on the Klamath River that didn’t always get along together, the sState of California entities , and water users – 13 groups to vote by consensus. I mean iIt was a really very labor intensive process. Jerry We and I spent a lot of time in Yreka and flying down to Arcadia Arcata to go those,to those meetings and, andto work on those plans. Bill Kerr was the contractor as I recall and helped put, uus developedevelop d those plans. And wWe also had input through this group into the, we hadfrom the Klamath Fisheries Management Council (KFMC) also established by the Act, which also provided input into the Pacific Fisheries Management Council which I…on harvest management of KalamathKlamath River Chinook Salmon stocks.
Jerry: Regulate regulatory…
Bill: Right provided you know recommendations on…
Jerry: Harvest.
Bill: …tSettinghe the annual harvest levels for Klamath fish. And it was always a really interesting debate. We’d hold our meetings just immediately prior to the Pacific Fisheries Management Council meeting and we would…figure out just what share of the fish everybody should getgot. The harvest was split between the ocean commercial and sport fishermen and the three KalamathKlamath River Tribes., And like I said one of my fond memories is up The KalamathKlamath River Tribes did not have a court decision like the Northwest Tribes in Washington or Oregon had. , Federal courts in the Boldt decision had ruled that the tribes were entitled to, through their treatyies, one half of the harvestable surplus of fish that were available in both in the Columbia River and all…Puget Sound.
Jerry: On the Columbia River itThat was called the Judge Bolt decision Sound..
Bill: That’s exactly right. And, and in Puget Sound as well so there were two different decisions. and at that time Secretary, who was the secretary?There was not a similar ruling for the Kalamath River Tribes.
Jerry: It was Secretary Babbitt.
Bill: Interior Secretary Babbitt washad just been new in officeappointed by President you know the Clinton. administration had just taken over from the Reagan’s and no from Bush…
Jerry: From Bush.
Bill: Bush Senior, four-term, four year President Bush. Andand tThe Secretary and his staff they were brand new in the office and we were trying to figure out how to apply the same rule, the Bolt and Bologna as the Court decisions in Oregon and Washington to the Klamath share, tribale share. And wWe were able to get the Secretary to sign off on a letter to the Pacific Fisheries Management Council that in his the Secretary’sies opinion, that the Klamath tribes were entitled to one half of the harvestable surplus of the fish in the Klamath.
Jerry: And wWe promulgated the regulations to how it would happen,. (inaudible).
Bill: Right.
Jerry: And Babbitt went over and got the Secretary of Commerce to concur and a publish the Regulations in The fFederal RregisterRegister notice ensued.
Bill: Yep. Yes that’s how it happened.
Jerry: And the s…. hit the fan! after that, then Babbitt got so much heat he said, “I don’t won’t take anymore of this crap from Region 1 without it first being reviewed in the Department.”
Bill: Yeah, about, ifbut, if we hadn’t been Jjohnny on the spot like you knowduring the first few months of his tenure-year or as Secretary of the Interior, we would of never been able to 18
2
accomplish that, and it, it was the right thing to do. and I know he the Secretary took a lot of heat for it but it ’swas still was the right thing to do. T and the commercial guys sued and PCFFA or whatever the…the Secretary. It was t
Jerry: Pacific Coast Federation…
Jerry and Bill: Fishermen.
Jerry: Based out of San Francisco.
Bill: They sued Pacific Coast Fishermen Federation Association (PCFFA) verses Bruce. Babbitt in a court case that went and we prevailed all the way to the Supreme Court. W and we prevailed! . as I recall. If it didn’t go to the Supreme Court it certainly went to the appeals courts but both…iIt was really a landmark opinion and something that , you know, we can all be proud of..
[Jerry – a side bar note – this put credibility and some teeth into the future recommendations by the Klamath Council. It demonstrated that there were the biology personnel and the science to back-up Council recommendations outside of the political arena.]
Jerry: And then Bill, you’ve been pretty busy all along, but then we had The lLower Snake River Compensation Plan going gangbusters, - building hatcheries, fish ways, fish collection stations. We had a whole new office over therein Boise, ID that was working with the states of Oregon and Washington and Idaho to operate these facilities. So when did you have your fun time for fun?
Bill: (Laughing) Yeah that, although Wally kind of did most of the heavy lifting I think on on the Lower Snake Comp. Plan and Ed Crateau was, was managing that office ; he had, whileand (Ken Higgs was there initially). Then Ed Crateau was hired for that position and those guysthat office really did a terrific job and it, it’s a, it’s a classic example of how to approply, appropriately develop a mitigation program for, for hydroelectric productsprojects.;. This program was developed to mitigate the fishery impacts ofby the four dams on the lower Snake River. and tThey set goals and objectives and, and set up a funding stream for that, those facilities and produced millions and millions of salmon and steelhead to mitigate for those, those projects. But then along came NOAA Fisheries in the early ‘90’s and it started listings for Pacific Salmon.
Jerry: Basically, just as a short recap for the record, the NOAA, between National Marine Fishery Service (NMFS) and Fish and Wildlife Service, have different responsibilities when it comes to salmon management. NMFS is in the Department of Commerce and under NOAA. NMFS is generally salt water tying with the fish. has the ESA responsibilities for Pacific salmon and the Fish and Wildlife Service is kind like the fresh water aspect of the fish’s lives.has diverse mitigation responsibilities.
Bill: Right, right.
Jerry: But the hammer of authority is still (inaudible) with the NMFS.
Bill: With.
Jerry: …with the NMFS and….
Bill: That’s correct.
Jerry: …it’s the parent agency NOAA.NMFS is in the Department of Commerce and under NOAA.
Bill: That’s correct. And (inaudible) they, they started listing these fish and, and I think everybody could see that this was going to be similar to the spotted owl. , I mean tThe region was already going through the whole spotted owl listing issue and President Clinton came out and, andwith Vice President Gore and all the Cabinet and did the, you know,convened a big round table discussion with folks from the region and tdiscussed the impacts of the owl listing. and that’s where hePresident Clinton directed the Secretaries to begin developing his as fForest mManagement pPlan for the west side. So we could see that, that the listing of salmon was going to have a similar kind of impact on, on theon the R region. . I, I don’t think we ever dreamed that it was going to have the impact that it has right now or has had over the, the last several years; last ten or more. But we found ourselves right in the middle of all of the endangered salmon issues from reviewing listing proposals, to begin developing recovery plans, to working with harvest… issues. H, how, how do you minimize impacts on, on listed fish and still allow a harvest.?
19
2
In fact one, another psort of a, you know, proud moment of mine is thatwas when Jim Martin, who at the time was Chief of Fisheries for Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, Steve Huffaker who was Chief of Fisheries for Idaho Fish and Game and Lee Blankenship who was Senior Fisheries Scientist for Washington Department of Fisheries determined that if we were going to have any kind of fishing at all then we were going to need to to mask, be able to massk mark all of the hatchery, salmon, that are produced. It was so that the anglers could release unmarked wild listed fish. And it took us years to run through the analysis to show that by doing this we would not impact, adversely impact the data bases, the (inaudiblecoded wire tag) data bases that had been established to, you knowin to collect harvest data in ocean and freswaterfreshwater fisheries as well as survival data.,
Wdetermine stock stasis and where they’re caught and those kinds of data. And we had to convince our biologist and everybody else that it really needed to be done implemented. and tTechnology was developeding to, where machines could mass mark these fish. I and it’sts now an …effective tool that fisheries managers are using in the Northwest to be able to selectiveselectively harvest those marked fish. so that, tThat was you know reala very satisfying accomplishment from my perspective.
Jerry: Given that this conflict between agenciesagency responsibilities, other than what is activelyhas been described, described, where inter-agency and one with another (inaudible), how would describe our relationship with the NMFS and NOAA?
Bill: Well the big, let me describe the big difference in our two agencies. One tThe Regional Directors for the Fish and Wildlife Service is are a member of the Senior Executive Service. H but he/she is not a political appointee, or what we call a schedule C appointee like the Director of the Fish and Wildlife Service. is; that he’s appointed by the President you know to hold that position. . The Administrator for NOAA Fisheries in Seattle for the Northwest Region on the other hand is a political appointee so he/she’s wais very much an animal of the Bush current Administration, (and during this period it was Bush), for example. And certainly, you know, has got a lot more pressure placed on him/her to conform with, with the administration’s policies and views then, thaen what a Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Director has. So having, you know, that as a major difference we have two agencies that have endangered species responsibility.
We, tThe Service has much broader ESA responsibilities than NOAA fisheries. B but they, if you’re in the fish business, they’re the big dog on the block because they’re listing salmon and steelhead throughout the Northwest and California. And wWe sit down in inter-agency groups with NOAA Fisheries to try to work on the development of, of…you know plans on how you’re gonna to manage the Columbia River for example. And, you know,The NOAA Fisheries the scientists will come in and give them the interagency group all of their data and information. ; I’d say most of the time scientifically, we agree with them,. although However, there are some scientists up in Seattle at the Mount lLake Research Center that their have a different scientific view of the fish and their its well being is slightly different then ourthan the Service doess.. They think that transportation of fish and in barges and things like that is an effective way to move fish through this system of nine hydro dams., our Service , biologists and states and tribe’s biologists firmly believed that that’s transportation is not in the best interest of the fish and, and they have the scientific data to show for itsupport that view. But those kinds of, one starting with the, with the different bias on the science and then having the political influence from the administrator often mayThe NOAA Regional Administrator who is a political appointee may bend the Endangered Species Act to the point where in our joint meetings at policy level, the administrator and Regional Directors, we go through point by point of where we don’t think they’re you knowbelieve they are using the best science and interpreting the Aact correctly. and here’s what we see as the consequences and then they go ahead and do it anyway. And then NOAA Fisheries gets sued and they the environmental supporters takes them to court here in Portland. 20
2
T and the judge pretty much goes through all the points that we made at our earlier , without our help advising him on that, and basically says meetings with NOAA and the other Federal Agencies. The Judge then says, “You got it all wrong, go back and start over again..”. And we’reWe are on about the fourth iteration of this thing right now.the Biological Opinion on the Columbia River Hydro System.
Jerry: Okay now yYou’ve been in the Fisheries Program now for a number of years and you retired leave the Fisheries Program basically out of the Fisheries Program. and move to other positions. Okay now it seems like with all this much fun you’re having in fish, sounds like it’s about time for a reorganization.
Bill: : Well I, I was yeah let’s…I mean we The Service went, we went through some several different reorganizations…
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: …also during this time.
Jerry: Okay now it seems like with all this much fun you’re having in fish, sounds like it’s about time for a reorganization Bill.
Bill: Well, we (chuckling) I think we had at least two or three. We then went from a Program Management System to; we decide that we wanted to have Ggeographic and ProgramaticProgrammatic ARD’s.. And so what we did was you became responsible for, like certain geographic area, I became the geographic ARD for the Columbia Basin. And at one, one reorganization I was in charge of all the refuges, all the ES offices and all the Fisheries in the Basin. And at the same time, I had Fisheries, in one iteration, I had Fisheries Program responsibilities so I was doing all the budgets for all of the Fisheries offices in, in the Region. And let’s see we did that for…
Jerry: And similarly there was another ARD that had a program responsibility for the Ecological Services… program, a
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …Prprogram that did all the funding and… for Ecological Services, Endangered Species, and Wetlands activities as well as operational responsibilities on an geographic basis…
Bill: Right. After five years we reorganized again.
Jerry: …budgeting for Ecological Services, Endangered Species, Wetlands…
Bill: Yeah.s
Jerry: …and As well as operational responsibilities on an geographic basis…
Bill: Like For Oregon and Washington.
Jerry: …And for Klamath Basin in California.
Bill: Yeahs.
Jerry: Yeah.
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: And then, what did we do?
Jerry: After five years we had been (inaudible).reorganized again.
Bill: Yeah Yes.and then wWWe went back to strictly pProgramaticProgrammatic ARD’s. and at thatThis time , so I was, Dan Diggs was became already, he was the Fisheries ARD. at that time I believe for…I think he became the Fisheries ARD when I was the pragmatic ARD, I think. Anyway whatever happened, no maybe he didn’t maybe he was my assistant just like you were.
Jerry: I was (inaudible) Ecological…
Bill: Yeah.
Jerry: …Services and Supervisor of California Klamath Basin.
Bill: Right. So then… Jerry: But the point is we is that went back to the program
Bill: Right.
Jerry: … (Inaudible) again and you ended up going to…What position did you have after this reorganization?
Bill: Well I could’ve become Fisheries ARD again if I wanted. I I mean thatit was my call. And I went to the Regional 21
2
Director…at that time it would of been (unsure of name), (unsure of name). Marv Plenert.
Jerry: No it was after (inaudible) it had to be Marve…
Bill: Marve, I went to Marve. And saidI told him, “You know,” I said “I’ve already done all that Fisheries ARD stuff.position and it was time for Dan Diggs to take that responsibility.” And w”We ’ve gothave all this the Endangered Species stuff issues on the Columbia River that, you knowso I, why don’t you just make me a Special Assistant for, to the Regional Director for Columbia River issues?”. And “I can be a surrogate you for all of these meetings and issues with NOAA Fisheries, and Bonneville Power, and the Corps of Engineers, and and everybody else that is involved these, other Federal Agencies, the States and Tribes involved thesee planning efforts and the development of bBiological oOpinions on the…” imactsimpacts of the Federal Hydropower System.”. He agreed!
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: “…impact of running the river.”
Jerry: And this is basically what you were doing then up until your retirement.
Bill: That’s correct.
Jerry: When did you retire?
Bill: I retired on December 31, 2004.
Jerry: That’s three or four years or three years ago.
Bill: Yeah, yeahs and I guess maybe just kind of wrap it; I mean tThe last few years was, you know, just a wonderful time during my career. I, I didn’t have to supervise anybody but I worked with all of the ARD’s and their staffs to get input on the various issues that, that I was working on. It, it was interesting, and challenging work. I just had an absolute ball; it was , you know, a grand time.
Jerry: Reflecting back on this grand time, if you had to pick an issue out of your 37- year career, what was the most burning issue that probably caused you to lose sleep or it was most important to the Service?
Bill: Wow (or well.)
Jerry: Can you?
Bill: Well there ’sare two or three the Klamath one you know with the water issues, one and where the Secretary of the Interior Norton shut off the water going down the Klamath River , you knowand diverted it for the irrigators.
Another, was Tthe, this whole Columbia River …planningEndangered Species Biological Opinion process for operations of the, the hydro-power system with Bonneville Power and the Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation. And NOAA Fisheries Fisheries whas got to be, it just was so frustrating because nobody wanted to listen to , you knowour opinion on, the proper way to implement the act. Nobody wanted to make the scarifiessacrifices and provide what the fish really needed which was water spill andwere flows. I mean everybody; yYou don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know what these fish need in the Columbia -- water but nobody’s….
Jerry: (Inaudible) water.
Bill: Yeahs bBut nobody was’s willing to bite the bullet and charge the electricity rate payers more money. and tThey were’re always trying to , you know, do a second class job. sSo that was frustrating.
Jerry: But that was one of the most pressing or major issues that you were dealing with?
Bill: Probably the biggest, biggest one.issue was when And I, I worked directly with Ann Klee, who was a sSpecial cCouncil to Secretary Norton Kempthorn on an adjudication issue for Snake River water rights with the tribes and the Bureau of Reclamation and the water users in Idaho. And she called me a lot of nasty names sometime myself and Bob Turner, who works for NOAA Fisheries, , weand I were just trying to make sure that this agreement would pass the biological rRed fFace 22
2
test when we had to look at it through ESA compliance. …you know filters to see whether it would pass muster We were representing our biologist and their input to the process and that was another one tissue that would keep you awake at night as well, so.. There was a lot of political pressure from the Secretary’s Office.
Jerry: Let’s, oOn kind of along the same line, what was a, what would you class as a high point in your career?
Something that really turned you on.
Bill: Well I that, some of those accomplishments I kind of mentioned earlier but certainly the completion of the first two Habitat Conservation Plans under ESA that was really exciting for me. The…I helpeding establish a rRefuge for endangered fish in a rRefuge sSystem that really, at that time, believed that the only refuge you should ever have would be for ducks. And to get an endangered little pup fish out in some desert springs was unheard of. and so that, I feel that like that was really a , ansignificant accomplishment.
The mass marking of Pacific Salmon hatchery fish, an issue, I’m proud to have been apart of that.
And I guess you know finally the, the…the real accomplishment was the outstanding people working, beingI was able to work with. the people that, that I’d been fortunate to work with, you included Jerry it’s, it’s a you know I don’t know where you’d find an agency where you have people that are, are more dedicated and committed to doing what’s right, working in frustrating conditions and situations. and just you knowThey putting their head down and shoulder to the wheel and got etting the job done. They are and, and really proud of the Service and what it , what it’s all about sostands for. , you know, that that’s one of the real fond things that I look onon thThe people are the heart of the Fish and Wildlife Service.
.
Jerry: Let’s do the flip side of that. W, was there a lotw point? Sound like you’d been pretty successful in (inaudible)your career but is there something that youmay wish if there was a do over?
Or something that’s because of the circumstances.
Bill: Oh yeah there’s probably more than one. One that I can think of and, and I don’t know if I’d do it over. I mean the outcome was the right outcome that was necessary. but Ann Badgely was the Regional Director at the time and afterwhen the, the Forest Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service and BLM developed the President’s Forest Management Plan for the Spotted Owl. on the west side,Following the development of that plan, President Clinton said, “Well that’s such a great idea, let’s do it on the east side. Forest Service and BLM lands.”
So they poured millions and millions of dollars into this planning effort. and of course tThe Fish and Wildlife Service is actively involved in, in helping develop these plans and figuring out riparian buffer widths for, foron fish bearing streams and all of thesemany very complicated natural resource issues to protect both fish and wildlife and maintain clean water. and all of these kinds of things and, and wWe invested hundreds of thousands of hours of our staff time in working on these plans and negotiating, you know, all of these incredible details. and these; I mean tThe documents were like telephone directories, you know, they were’re huge documents.
And wWe would brief the Secretary ; we’d briefand David Hazysee who was the Under Secretary, the number two person in the Interior. Regularly he would try to intervene and help mediate the discussions. W where we’d get inwe would have biological issues situations where we just could not sign off on these plans. because, for biological reasons, and so the Forest Service, Wwe had the executive committee whciwhich consisted of like three or four rRegional fForesters and same SstateState dDirectors for BLM and, and the Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Director and NOAA Fisheries Regional Administrator.. We’d get on the phone and this was right at the end of the Clinton administration. W and we got down to crunch time where we either had to acquiesce and give up a 23
2
whole bunch, which would cost some adverse affects on the natural resources in
Tthe Columbia River Basin or go along with it.
So we’re on a conference call with Ann Badgely and Donna Darm and from NOAA Fisheries and Will (unsure of last name)Stelle and the RegionaRegional aAdministrator of NOAA and all the; David Haze Hayse the Under Secretary Secretary of Interior. B and basically we had to say we can’t go along with it.the Plan. And, and I looked Ann in the eye , we were in our conference room,and I put the phone on mute and I said, “We can’t do this! .” And I said “We’re just giving up everything if we do.” So she stood tall and, and said “No, we’re not going to do itsupport the Plan.” And David Haze just kind of threw a fight fit he said, “You know I’ve worked in a lot of difficult situations and I’ve, we’vehave always found ways to come to an agreement and I’ve just never seen anything like thiese group here.” And he hung up. And I really had a lot of respect for that guy. H, he was terrific and I wish, I wish there had a, had been more time in a way where we could of, you know, to come together, maybe face to face with him, and just to see if we could find a solution to that problem and complete the, the plans. I and everything else but and it died on the vine.
I mean it just…
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: And iIt may have been too big an effort to begin with, the Columbia Basin’s the size of France and how do you write a Natural Resource Plan for an area that big, so?. I don’t know. That would be a nice one to do over over.I think if we could.
Jerry: Let’s jump tracks a little bit. Is there, can you single out a person or persons that helped shape your career, or persons? Who’s had the biggest influence on you?, Bill
(inaudible, Bill starts talking)?
Bill: Well there’s been several.
Jerry: Did they Aacted as mentors or..?
Bill: Mm-huh.Yes.
Jerry: Guidance counselor?
Bill: The first one, and I still talk to him regularly, regul, regularly, is Doctor Hank Sather who was my major professor and helped me get started in , in themy career with the Fish and Wildlife Service. but Ccertainly his influences as my major professor and, and on my committee you know for my graduate degree, had a tremendous influence on me. Th
en… Dick Smith, you know my second supervisor, has always been a close personal friend. and Hhe ultimately became Deputy Director for a number of years. And Dick and I talk fairly regularly, still today asre good friends and he’s always been one I’ve turned to for advice.
Dick Myshak, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Fish Wildlife and Parks and a Region 1 RD , was a good and neighbor ‘til he moved to California and who also gave me, gave me good advanceadvice.
And Deanna , I, you know, shehas… been an insperationinspiration and a stongstrong supporter of my career. She has
Jerry: Well.
Bill: She’s stood by me through , you know, all these moves and really, really played an important role in our partnership with the family of the Fish and Wildlife Service family. and oOur doors were always open to people that , you know, would be coming into town or whatever, so.on business.
Jerry: Okay, . I Want to ask another little question. here. Of all of the things thatchanges that you’ve seen that in the Fish and Wildlife Service metamorphize or change over the years. Wwhat do you see havehas been really a good thing that’s happened in the Service? In your opinion?for the organization?
Bill: Well I think one thing, and it’s still not enough. , but I think the budgets back when you and I started our careers Jerry, you know, paile in comparison to what the budgets are today. 24
2
Grant it I, I know if you went and talked to any Regional Director they’d probably say there’s still , you know, a huge need out there but I, I think when we started getting a half a billion dollar budget for the Service you know it was like we were kind of getting out of the tiny little agency arena and up into one where you had , you know, thousands of people working for us and doing good things for, for the resource...
And I also think that the ability of this agency to maintain its scientific integrity is really important. and I think they’re really, you know, the biologist biologists out therein the Service are really trying to do, to maintain that standard. It may getThe data may have different translations as it goes moves up the food chain and the closer you get , you know, to the political appointees. T things are going to change in them. . That use to frustrated me a lot until a friend of mine who was in NOAA Fisheries, Don Knoll is the guys name, he was fairly high up back in D.C. and he said, “You know, you shouldn’t get so frustrated because you gotta need to understand they won the election. , you know. If the administration does things that you don’t agree with, you have to step back and say yeah, they did win, you know.” And, you know, I, I don’t even want to get started with this the Bush administration.; I’m glad I retired when I did and I still had a positive attitude but I can understand the pressures put on our folks today. It have has to be, has to be very difficult to try to get them to, to do the right things. And I think the Director Dale Hall, you knowwho is a good friend of mine, is trying to do that and has brought some positive leadership back to the sService.
which, which we’ve needed.
Jerry: On the flip side again, have you seen things in the Service that they’ve given up doing that you think was wrong? That is actually been detractedion from the quality of the Service?
Or you have a pretty positive…
Bill: Well no, no I…backOne example was when Secretary Babbitt was sold a bill of goods to take rResearch out of the Fish and Wildlife Service and put it in Geological Survey. was the, I mean I, I think Bruce Babbitt’s one of the best Secretaries we’ve ever had. He’s second to Cecil Andrus in my opinion who I think was one of the really great ones but, but when he got sold a bill of goods to pull rResearch out of the Fish and Wildlife Service a…
Jerry: Capital R research.
Bill: Exactly. And put it over in Geological Survey was the biggest mistake that he ever made. That technical biological arm of the Fish and Wildlife Service really focused on, on things that were important to us and we didn’t have to go through a whole new, you know, dDirector and everything else with different priorities;. wWe had our own labs, we you know we built a beautiful lab up in Seattle for Fisheries and Aquatic Research. And nNow we hardly ever talk to them. And iIt’s a shame! , you know. And I think that’s the biggest mistake I’ve ever seen that…this agency’s madke.
Jerry: Bill I’m going to ask you about , you knowhow, it’s not been all work and no play. That there were events and there’s things that have happened; there’s gotta has to be some stories about your career that illustrate the fcomradely the foolishness,un times and the other aspects that just, they’re some of them are just good yarns. Do you have anything that you’d like to get on record?
Bill: Oh dear, I have lots of them. I it’s whether I can. ; tThis would probably be a lot juicer if you know youwe had a couple of drinks (laughing).
Jerry: Well this isn’t an afternoon session…
Bill: Right, right.
Jerry: …(inaudible) have to do this at…
Bill: I’m drinking water so we’re okay. (Inaudible) I remember when I was in Michigan we were doing a pesticide study and we were collecting all different kinds of, of aquatic birds and animals and whatever and we went onto the Shiawassee rRefuge in Saginaw Refuge in Michigan. And so we’re, we’ve got you know aWe have a Federal gGame aAgent with us and we’re driving with the new refuge biologist, a 25
2
brand spanking new you know shiny penny right out of college. , you know, was with us and I’m sitting on the hood of a government vehicle holding a shotgun, driving the back roads in, in Michigan in, on the refuge. And here’sThere was a whole flock of shorebirds on the other side of the, the water control, the ditch. Sso I ground (unclear)slucedsluiced them and I must have killed eight or ten. I don’t know how many and well it’s winter and the water is really, really cold.
so we’re talking well…
Jerry: But you’re sitting up on the hood of this thing with a shot gun?
Bill: Yeah.
Jerry: Oh.
Bill: Yeah (laughing).
Jerry: You were literally riding shot gun.
Bill: Yeah, (laughing) Exactly. And, and so , so the biologistwe said, (inaudible) said, “We’ll we ’reneed to go back and get a canoe and then we can paddle over and get it” and whatever.the birds. And we said, “Okay well we’ll do that.” The biologist said, “Oh we don’t have to do that.” Well wWe talked him into taking off all of his clothes off and he goes down and jumps in this, (laughing) this ice-cold water and swam across and picked up these birds. So he was a great retriever, he took hand signals pretty well but his nose wasn’t real good.
But that’s one then Another joke there was always the joke about the, the law enforcement agents, who wasare and they were a pretty ruckus bunch, way back when but not so much anymore. but way back when. They, they worked hard and they played hard and they drank hard. And I think tThis same biologist I spoke about, we had one time you know had a bottle of Jim Beam and or something and, and were passing it back and forth in a paper sack and thenwhile we were we getinggetting ready to go eat.
t…
Jerry: In a Government car?
Bill: Yeahp! , then we, wWe were getting ready to go eat and he’s sitting back there and he’s just green as can be. and hHe is ’s hanging out the window, eventually, you know, loosing his lunch. We really (inaudible). Law eEnforcement guys were really, really notorious for that kind of stuff stuff. and you always, theThere was a question was, you know,: “Do you know why law enforcement agents drink Jim Beam whiskey?” And the answer is, “Because it comes in a square bottle and it will not roll out from underneath the seat of the car.”
One other time I remember when I went down to Horicon National Wildlife Refuge in Wisconsin from Minneapolis and I was going to help law enforcement guys…do a patrol, you know, on goose hunting patrol on the refuge for the weekend. ; I just thought it would be interesting., something to do. So I get down there, I driveove down from Minneapolis after work and get there it’s probablyat 9:30 , 10:00 and checked into the hotel, motel where the guys agents are staying. Oand of course they’re all in bed asleep. and the galThe girl who was checking me in said, “Oh Mr. Shake, well” you know “it’s nice to see you.” Your friends are already here, in fact they wanted to know which room you were going to be in ” and whatever “and wanted to get the key.” And I thought well that’s great maybe they probably left me a , you know, glass of whiskey or something and they’d meet down, meet themme down in the lobby the next morning. And sSo I go in my room and I’m looking around and there’s no drink poured or anything. and so I go in to use the bathroom and here’s a live Canada goose standing in my bathtub, live.. Standing is the operative word. Well they had found this goose andthere was goose shit poop all over my bathtub, I mean you can’t imagine what it looked like. So I had left him in there the tub. you know andI get up the next morning and let him loose in the room and wash out the tub so I can take a shower. And I go down to meet these guys with this goose under my arm the next morning. and the, Tthey found this goose walking across the road as they were coming out of the refuge. T and they have a place pen on the Refuge where they put crippled geese, you know, on the refuge and try to see if they’re gonna goninggoing to recover. make it or not and sSo they thought it would be fun to , you know, just 26
2
put the goose in my room for the evening and then they will deliver it to the pen the next day. But they were, theyThe LE Agents were always doing stuff like that; it was, was really a lot of fun. But let’s see, let’s pause it for a sec… (paused).
So another time, telling stories on myself, I, I was in Lansing, Michigan. and I was scheduled to pick up two guys from the rRegional oOffice that were flying into …Detroit,orDetroit or so I thought. T, that’s the operative word, to pick up ‘em they’re they were going to spend a week out in the field field with me.or whatever and man I got up late and I’m going like crazy and I wheel into the airport at Detroit and I’ve got the flight numbers and everything else and I park the car and I run in and I read onlook at the reader board and I, you know, I just kind of did it, by two wheels really to, to get in there on time.. And there’s no flight number that matched and of course that was back before cell phones or anything else. and then I got to really studying the itinerary and they flew into Toledo (laughing), which is about an hour away. So somehow I got a hold of them, I don’t know, I can’t remember exactly how I did it but I got a hold of theym, I mean they’re not going to go anyway cuz I’m their ride but tThat was pretty embarrassing for me to not even be able to get the right airport , you know, for picking up the big wigs from the rRegional oOffice.
Deanna and I one time at, I guess you know I mentioned we would often have people come over and spend the night with us and, and when we first went to work and lived in this wonderful old house in Lafayette, Indiana. It was a hundred year old house., and tThe Regional Supervisor, Ki Faulkner, for Animal Damage Control came down to visit the Lafayette office. W and we had all day meetings with him and whatever and so we invited him to …come out and have dinner with us and then spend the night. cuz we lived outside in the country and so (inaudible) thought that was a good idea andAt that that time I’d been shooting a lot of ducks so we, that was ourour sort of usual company meal would be roast duck. and Deanna did a really nice job at fixingpreparing the meal. that andAfter dinner we said good night. finally got ready for bed and hisKi’s bedroom was upstairs on the second floor. and get up and he goes upstairs and we’reDeanna and I get in bed and all of a sudden we hear this huge crash and I go running upstairs. Well the, I’d had forgotten the flats on thithats, my dad cut bed slats for theses box springs and the mattress too short., well you know iIf you kind of bounced on the bed the wrong way or whatever the slats were just too short and they would fall out. And so here i’s Ki Faulkner , you know, with his feet sticking up in the air you know the mattress , you know, (laughing)was down in between the side boards of the bed. O; oh man, that was embarrassing. I think we wound up just putting him on the floor, put the mattress on the floor. (inaudible).
But…wWe had a lot of good times with the ADC folks., a lot of, you know, we’d, we’dWe conducted work these surveys of bird damage to field corn. damage surveys and we’d…working on chemical…that we, chemical,We were field testing a chemical called Avitrol which we placed on cracked corn and then we would have theis treated grain applied by ag spray planes. chemically treated corn that we’d spray on corn fields and then theWhen the flocks of red-winged black birds would , wouldenter the field and some would eat it off the ground and go into distress and give calls that would frighten the rest of the birds from the field.calls . And so I remember Dick Smith and I, we’d stay in this, you know, were staying in a cabin really up on Lake Erie shores and in the evening and we’d just sit there and shoot boxes of shells at black birds just streaming into the marsh, you know, for, forto roosting at night. We also we used this same compound, Avaitral andit was called, and we’d put it on, on chunks of bread and then you’d feed that to sea gulls. Y and you’d get two or three gulls going through distress and you could scare them off of a garbage dump. And I got was called to go down to Cleveland to show these guysthe airport authorities how to use Aviatral on the dump, which was on one end of the runway at the Cleveland Airport which was boarded by right along Lake Erie. and on the east end of the run way is their The garbage dump attracted thousands of gulls , which is a you knowwere big hazard for, for aircraft coming inlanding or taking off. with all these birds, you know, right in the flight line. So we would go out to the dump and there would be ’s several thousands gulls on the thingfeeding on the 27
2
garbage. and I would start chumming them in with clean bread crumbs and to get them closer and use to their wolfing ‘emeating the pieces of bread. down and I then would throw out three or four of the se treated pieces. T and then the gulls would start going through this their distress calls and they’re flopping on the ground and they’re giving off distress calls and so all thesethe thousands of gulls take off;. tThey’re all alarmed and they start spiraling right straight up over the end of the runway and here’s these planes, are coming in for a landing. you know, they’re like several thousand feet up. And Tthese planes are coming right through these masses of gulls and I thought, “Oh boy if I, if I cause a plane wreck, this is probably not going to be a real good thing for the Fish and Wildlife Service.” (Laughing) But anyway, we use to have a lot of fun.
Jerry: We’re coming to the end here, Bill. D; do you have any, any final thoughts?
Bill: Well I, one I really appreciate the opportunity Jerry, to be able to do this. I think the history of the an agency or organization is really important and I think collecting these oral histories are gonnawill be , you know, a real benefit for the agency itself and also for others who wanna, wannawant to take a look at how we have arrived at where we are today;. iIt’s always good to go back and look at the history. so that’sIt’s been really a privilege for me to be able to do it and I know you’ve been doing a lot of these and it takes a lot of your time and I really appreciate that.
. And I…
Jerry: And it also provides an opportunity to ground truth the things the way they really were more than what you’d see in an official cleansed report to Congress.
…
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: …or in a report to the Secretary. This is the battle lines that were drawn on the ground by the people who were there.
Bill: Yeps. That’s right, that’s exactly right. And I guess just, you know, iIn summary, in terms of my career with the Fish and Wildlife Service been just you know couldn’t have been better in my opinion. I’ve been really fortunate to work with a lot of great people and work on a lot of really interesting issues. I personally feel like I, I got out at the right time in two thousand, the end of 2004. I think were I to be, be employed right now with the Fish and Wildlife Service with the current administration, I’d probably be very, very frustrated. But hopefully that with Dale Hall , you know, he’s goat the helm and, andhe is doing a good job. B but boy this has been a tough bumpy road for, for the folks that are in the trenches and I urge them to just hang on, we’ve only got 342 days or something like that, I think, left to go so a. And stay true to the science. Anyway, thanks again for doing this.
Jerry: Glad to do it Bill. This is Jerry Grover, who’s been interviewing Bill Shake, doing the oral history. And it’s on the 10th day of February 2008 on an lovely Oregon day.
28
2

Click tabs to swap between content that is broken into logical sections.

Oral History Cover Sheet
of
Name: William F. Shake
Date of Interview: February 10, 2008
Location of Interview: PortlandTigard, Oregon at the home of Jerry Grover
Interviewer: Jerry C. Grover
Oral History Program
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
National Conservation Training Center
Shepherdstown, West Virginia
Approximate years worked for Fish and Wildlife
Service:
37½ years from 4/17/1967 to
12/31/2004
Offices and/ Field Stations Worked, Positions
Held:
Started outBill Shake began his career with the U.S. Fish &
Wildlife Service in Region 3 Minneapolis with as a temporary
appointment with in the Animal Damage Control ,( ADC)
program, in Lafayette, Indiana. His first permanent then got
permanent position was as a field biologist in Region 3 with
ADC . Then and was assigned to Ohio, few for several weeks,
to help the Wildlife Services program on Lake Erie., W when
finished , he with became the Assistant State Supervisor with
ADC in Lansing, Michigan. He then wWent to the Regional
Office in Minneapolis as a staff biologist with ADC/Wildlife
Services and, was the acting Endangered Species Biologist.
His next move was to Washington, then went to D.C., for the
year-long Departmental Manager Development Program (
DMDP) Program. Part of his training assignment was
withWorked for Dick Myshak, Deputy Assistant Secretary for
Fish, Wildlife & Parks on a task force to implement the Alaska
Native Clams Settlement Act. NextAt the completion of the
training program, he served as Wwaas staff biologist with the
Division of Program Plans in D.C. ,
in In 1982 he transferred to Region 1 Portland was as the
Assistant Regional Director (ARD) for Endangered Species
and Federal Aid, from there he went on to become then became
the Assistant to the ARD for Ecological Services, the Deputy
ARD for Fisheries eventually becoming the, then ARD for the
Fisheries Program of the Pacific Region. He then moved on to
become the multi-program Became was the Geographic ARD
for the Columbia River Basin. He and then becamecompleted
his career as the Special Assistant to the Regional Director for
the Columbia River issues.
Colleagues and Mentors: Dr. Hank Sather (professor),
Dick Smith, Dick Myshak, Fred QuartzelCourtsel, Wes Jones,
Jack Hemphill, Bob Herbst, Jack Berryman, Ed Verburg, Mike
Spear, Ed Chamberland, Wally Steucke, Joe Blum, Sandy
Wilbur, Wayne White, Gail Kobetich, Dave Riley, Fred
Vincent, Jim MorinWarrien.
Most Important Issues: Bill was intricately involved in
dDeveloping a wildlife resources restoration and management
plan for the Klamath River Basin in NothernNorthern
California, was the Service policy represenitiverepresentative
on the Pplanning process for the Columbia River dealing with
operations of the hydro-power system which is operated by the,
Bonneville Power Administration, Corps of Engineers and the
Bureau of Reclamation. He aAlso dealing represented the
Service on the with Snake River water rights adjudication
which involving involved the tribes, the and Bureau of
Reclamation and private water interestswater issue in Idaho.
The and NOAA Fisheries listing of the Pacific Salmon was also
a factor in the negotiations.
Bill and Deanna Shake - 2010
Brief Summary of Interview: Bill tTalks about where
he was born, growing up near the college he went to, becoming
interested in the outdoors and the Fish & Wildlife Service. He
talks about when he met his wife, going to college and graduate
school, getting a job with the FWS, getting married and having
two daughters. He talks about the various jobs that he has had
2
2
with the Service including working for Animal Damage Control/Wildlife Services, being in the Departmental Management Development P Program, and being ARD for various programs ofr the sServices. Bill talks about high about the high and low points of his career, things he thought were good ideas and others that he would consider doing over. He also talks about people who influenced him, and the good and bad changes or decisions that have occurred in the FWS. And he mentions some of the fun times that he has had working for FWS and he gives his final thoughts on his career, the accomplishments that were made and the people he worked with.
Insert
a
Picture
THE ORAL HISTORY
Jerry: This is Jerry Grover a retired Ecological Services & Fishery supervisor in the Portland Regional Office. This is Jerry Grover I’m doing an oral history today with, with Bill Shake regarding his career with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The purpose of this interview is part of a program to preserve the heritage and culture of the U. S. Fish & Wildlife Service through the eyes of its employees. Joining me us is Deanna Shake and Judy Grover. Would you state your name for the record, please.
Bill: This is William F. Shake. e…I was born in Macomb, Illinois on January the 20th, 1942.
Jerry: What is Macomb, Illinois like? Is that farm city?
Bill: It’s, kind of a dichotomy - it’s both a, a farming community and the home of Western Illinois University, where I went to kindergarten all the way through a master’s degree; 22 years at the same campus. iIt’s in west central Illinois about forty miles from,and equal distance from the Mississippi River and the Illinois River. It’s a very rich farming country. and it also is the home of Western Illinois University, where I went through kindergarten all the way through a master’s degree; 22 years at the same, same campus.
Jerry: (Inaudible) What got you interested in the Fish and Wildlife thingsresources?
Bill: Well I think my parents really helped me learn to enjoy the, the out doors. My, both my parents were avid fishermen 3
2
and I started it you know as soon as I was able to hold a cane pole fishing rod and when I was finally old enough, my dad would take me duck hunting. This was, even way before I could even carry a shotgun but I’d go, go out to the duck blinds with him and his friends.
Jerry: And you had to swim out for the ducks?
Bill: No, I’d (chuckling) I didn’t have to do that but I really enjoyed watching the birds and the hunting the experience and from there I just sort of progressed. We had a friend that had a cabin out on the Mississippi River and we bought a little runboat and motor about (unclear) and then I started trout line fishing on the river for catfish and catch snapping turtles and enjoyed just poking around in the marshes along the, the river. I and just had a wonderful, wonderful childhood enjoying the outer doors.
Jerry: What’d your parents do?
Bill: My father was affiliated with the Western Illinois University. He originally taught physics there and then eventually moved, as part of the facilityfaculty, moved intothen, he was in charge of the physical plant at the University so you know which included all the heating, cooling, electricityal , everything;and maintaincemaintenance work. hHe managed all of the, the folks that made the, you know, the physical plant work at the University.
run.
Jerry: Okay, so you were living a pretty good life!
Bill: Yes, we lived right across the street from the campus from, the street from the campus. I literally walked, you know, a couple blocks to school and to the University. My mom was originally a schoolteacher and then after that she had me, she was a stay at home mom.
Jerry: During those early years, as you were growing up and got into high school, did you have jobs, school, after school jobs?
Bill: I, itt seemed like I was always working. I, aAs soon as I was big enough to ride a bicycle I started delivering newspapers. I remember I had like 80 people on my newspaper route and I’d deliver papers seven days a week and I remember on the holidays you knowwhich had big sale editions on a Sunday paper; I’d have to make two or three trips with my bicycle to be able to get those papers delivered. Also, you know I worked in a grocery store, I mowed yards you knowand all the usual types of things that, that kids, types of jobs kids had back then.
Jerry: Did you have any time for hobbies?
Bill: Hunting and fishing , you knowwere my main hobbies. I was also active in Boy Scouts and I earned the Eagle Scout rank. .
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: Then mMy folks really got me started doing that; those were probably my major hobbies. I enjoyed playing with my neighbors and friends and kids.
Jerry: Let’s jump into something, you mentioned, that you went to Western Illinois University.
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: And yYou said you had (inaudible), gotrecievedreceived a masters degree. What year were your degrees? And what was your major?
Bill: I majored in Zoology. T and I, wethe University didn’t have a wildlife management or fisheries management curricularum, and it was either zoology, microbiology or, botany, nature. I got my Bachelors of Science in Zoology in 19’64 and I got my Masters of Science in Zoology in 19’67. I did my master thesis on a wood duck nesting study and how the impact of starlingss at that timewhich were taking over wood 4
2
duck nest boxes and really causing a lot of wood ducks to abandon their nests. and not raise broods during that particular year by taking over the box and they wanted, w
We wanted to see if they starlings were having the same affect in natural cavities in trees. so I, I spent two years, two summers gathering data and then the final year I wrote my thesis.
Jerry: (Unclear) dDid it go up to the jJournal of Wildlife Management or anything like that?
BBill: Yes it did, yeah it was published.
Jerry: Published there so…
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: …it was a good piece of work then.
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: Okay. What, sSounds like you were getting pretty well prepared if you were doing your masters on wood ducks. Was that wherewhat, led you to your first job?
Bill: Well it, yYes it was. I, I really, I knew I wanted to go to work for either the state or a federal fFish and wWildlife aAgency and back at that time Illinois had an opening,the Illinois Department of Conservation, had an opening. and I applied, and as luck would have it, and this really is was torturous fortunate that the secretary lost my application. T and they found it after they had already selected somebody. ; I found out later. But in order to cover themselves they had to go through the process of interviewing me so under the pretense that the job was still open. I went to Springfield and they interviewed me and unbeknownst to me, the guy that got the job was sitting out in the you know the foyer waiting to come in and talk to the guys that were doing the interview. So it was good news that I didn’t get hired by Illinois Department of Conservation because I wouldn’t have had the, the great career I’ve had with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. And it just happened that my, my major professor, my advisor who at that time the was Dean of graduate school, Dr. Hank Sather he knew Goodie Gordon Larson. H really, really well in Minneapolis he was Personnel Director for the rRegional oOffice in Minneapolis. He put me in contact with Goodie Mr. Larson and on April 17, I was, of 1967, I was hired on as a four 4-month temporary GS- 5 because of a job freeze for permanent hires.
Jerry: You had graduated by this time?
Bill: Yes I had graduated. So this temporary appointment was with the ADC, Animal Damage Control program, Wildlife Services at that time I think it was, and we moved to Lafayette, Indiana. and I think my annual salary at that time was less than $5,000. back in 1967.
Jerry: That would have been your GS 5 then?
Bill: A GS 5 starting out and sSo I did my four4-month assignment and the job freeze or whatever you know ended. I was able to resign from that position and then they picked me up the very next day as a permanent, full-time employee.
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: And bBecause I had my masters degree I was eligible for a GS- 7, so I got a raise.
Jerry: Were you able to avoid the military? or did you…
Bill: No. I… went up to Chicago, back when we had draft cards, and I had to go up for a physical. And I’ve always had a high blood pressure problem. A, as a kid I couldn’t play football in high school because of my blood pressure but I could play basketball; I never did understand that, but anyway I went up to Chicago., wWhen they checked my blood pressure it was high so the procedure was they put you up in a room overnight and took take your blood pressure twice. then tThe next and day it was still high so they gave me a 1-Y status on my draft card, which means if they go to war and they really need a warm body they would of drafted me but otherwise I didn’t get drafted. I and was able to complete college and, and go right to work for the Service.
Jerry: Deanna is with us today. When does she come into the picture?
5
2
Bill: Well she and her brother and their folks moved to Macomb probably when I was a high school semaphoresophmoresophomore, freshman.
Deanna: You were a Junior.
Bill: She’s telling me when I was a junior twhen they moved here.
Deanna: OH!
Bill: No, no they moved to Macomb before that.
Deanna: I moved when I was in 7th grade.
Bill: Yes, so Deanna was in 7th grade when she moved there and I was two years ahead of her in school. And her brother and I were in the same grade and so I always walked to school with him and Deanna. B (someone saying something in background) being the little sister, she would always walk up ahead of us and you know like I said it was only a couple blocks to the school and you know she was really attractive (unclear, chuckling) in 7th grade, I thought she was pretty. (inaudible). But aA year or so later I, I did ask her to go out and her folks asked their son, my friend Ron, you know what kind of guy I was and he gave me a glowing report and so I was able to take Deanna out on our first dDate and… a long story short we’ve been going together and had been married for 46 years.
Jerry: Been a long time and been married and yYou had children, I take it.
Bill: We have two daughters; Chantal Shantel and Jennifer, both of those girls were born after we were transferred up to Lansing, Michigan.
Jerry: The daughters are on the west coast now?
Bill: Yes Chantal Shantel lives here in Portland and Jennifer lives up in a suburb near SalemSeattle.
Deanna: Seattle.
Bill: Or Seattle I mean, I’m sorry.
Jerry: Okay. Let’s, let’s take a jump back to start on your career now. You got have your temporary appointment; you now have been hired as a GS- 7 Biologist in Region 3. in Minneapolis office. What was that job?
Bill: It was a, I was field biologist with Wildlife ServicesAnimal Damage Control and basically what we were doing is when people were having problems with depredating birds or, or voles in apple orchards, roosting birds you know in cities or whatever, they would, would call our office. and wWe’d come out and provide assistance on showing folks how to, how to reduce the, the affects of the animals; whether they’re groundhogs and (someone speaking in background)in pastures or you know blackbirds birds eating corn , or eating fruit off of commercially grown fruittrees
.
Jerry: In other words as a biologist you are now all of a sudden your killing things.
Bill: That’s correct. We were, we were quite good at it actually.
Jerry: And the division you were a wildlife biologist, wWhat was the division? It was Predator and Rodent Control that then they went to Animal …Jerry and Bill: …Damage Control and then they went to…
Bill: …Wildlife …Services!
Jerry and Bill: …Services.
Jerry: And you started out…
Bill: Then back to ADC, I think it was…
Jerry: Animal Damage…
Bill: I think it was Animal Damage Control when I…
Jerry: (inaudible, speaking at same time). That’s when the federal government had taken on…
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …The Service waswe were doing coyotes in other parts of the country. But you were working primarily on bird depredation?
Bill: Yeah eExactly.
Jerry: But you were, you would sayworking primarily on bird depredation? Which is… 6
2
Bill: Yeah we,Yes cCoyotes hadn’t become really a problem in the mid-west like they are now. I know Tthey’re more, certainly more prevalent now thaen they were when I was a field biologist. then but wWe dealt mostly with rodent control,and bird control. things like that. We even had a program, at that time, where we would, cities would or municipalities, counties would call us that if they had landfills and if theythat were overrun with rats. and wWe would go out and make a survey of the dump the at night before and, you know with flashlights, and count the number of rats we’d see. and tThen we’d go buy cases of canned dog food and mix up the dog food with a chemical called zinc phosphide. and then wWe’d go out with these buckets of this mixture and we’d plop it all around the dump. And then we’d come back to the dump about three or four days later do another survey to see how effective we were. And…
Jerry: Were you?
Bill: We were.
Jerry: Who was your first boss?
Bill: My first boss was Fred QuartzelCourtsel; he was athe sState sSupervisor in Lafayette, Indiana. We also hasd a bait station at Lafayette where we mixed up lots of thesebait compounds and then supplyied those it to county extension agents and, to other wWildlife sWServices offices around the country. So it was kind of a, you know,a combination field office and a bait station.
Jerry: How long were you at Lafayette then?
Bill: Ten months.
Jerry: Ten months, tThen what happened?
Bill: Well I had been assigned to over to Ohio and to help out the Wildlife Service’s Office over there do some corn depredation surveys up on Lake Erie. And aAt the time Dick Smith was the State Supervisor at Columbus and so I went over there for several weeks and, and did corn damage assessments. W and then when I got back from that, and this was in the late summer/fall, and when I got back from that assignment I got a call to come over to Columbus. and I took Deanna with me and walked into Dick Smith’s office. Before we saw Dick the secretary said, “Oh you must be the new person going to Lansing, Michigan.” Well this was all news to me. So she kind of let the cat out of the bag.
but…
Jerry: What year was this?
Bill: That would be 1968.
Jerry: ’68.
Bill: So, you knowI, talked to Dick, and he offered me the job as Assistant State Supervisor in Lansing, Michigan. and iIt was a one person station and then I’d be in charge of all the ADC work in, in Lansing and I remember…Michigan.
Jerry: Did you get a promotion?
Bill: Yes I got arecievedreceived a GS 9 out of thatpromotion to GS-9. We went out to Dick’s house for lunch and Dick put the sale on, ontalked to Deanna about moving to Lansing. and we lived in, iIn Lafayette we lived in this this one hundred year old… farmhouse and it was on about 360 acres and it was great; had a small mouth bass stream in the back yard and pheasants and quail you know and it was pretty nice. We raised bird dogs at the time and so it, we really enjoyed Lafayette. B but Michigan was, waswas also a really a nice place to live as well so.
Jerry: WOkay again, what was your, what were your daily activities? You’re a one-man office.
Bill: We worked a lot up there with orchardists, either blueberry growers orin their apple orchards showing them how to control voles, which would you know girdle the fruit trees. Some of the species of voles would actually eat the roots and really reduce the vitality of those trees and the amount of fruit 7
2
that they could produce. and of course tThe birds physically were causing damage and also lo loss to cherries, and blueberries. So we were working, we did a lot of work with the Service’s Denver Research Lab. and tThey had a bird group out there, a bird depredation group and so we would run a lot of field tests using various noise makers, using spray- on repellants and of things like that to …ssee if we could finds ways to, to reduce the depredation.
We also , in Michigan, gotwere involved with an endangered species - issues the Kirtland’s warble warbler. They only nest, only in jack pine stands in central Michigan, north central Michigan. And tTheir habitat tree age was really specific it would beand the birds would only nest in stands that were only seven to fifteen, seventeen years old. and fFire was the you know the you know the regenerative factor for these, these habitats. and a lot of it was on a national guard base. The birds were, were not doing well at all there’s just you knowwith the population level down to a few hundred birds I mean less than like two or three hundred. I think, if I remember right. And we found out if you; they were having problemsThe reason for the decline was with cowbird parasitism. where The cowbirds would lay an egg or two in the Kirtland’s warblers nest, they were a ground nesting bird, and then the of course the cowbird fledgling nestling would take over the nest and, and eat all the food and the Kirtland’s nestlings wouldn’t make it. And so this was a big reason why they were, were not doing well. So wWe found outdiscovered that if you trap the cow birds that we could significantly increase the, the fledgling rate for Kirtland’s,. significantly, really significantly. And so wWe set up a big cowbird trapping program in Michigan and the nesting habitat. ; we’d We would do breeding birdgo out surveys for the birds every spring and then we’d, we’d set up traps, decoy traps. where you’d have you know We would getcatch some black birds to act as decoys to attract the cowbirds in to the trap. and, and we, wWe killed hundreds and hundreds of cowbirds every year. And This program really put the Kirtland’s warbler back on the track to you know sustainability. and, and survival so that was a, you know, a major accomplishment.Currently there are over 1,700 Kirktland’s Warblers. Three of us wrote a publication, wrote a paper and it was published in a Michigan scientific journal called the, The Kirtland’s Warbler of all things. But anyway that was one activity, Jerry, of many.I was also the leader of the Recovery Team who wrote the Recovery Plan for the species.
This program was a very rewarding activity.
Jerry: It sounds like your tying, in Lansing (inaudible) you were doing a lot of educating of the farmers as on to how to control animal problems rather than physically hands on. Were you providing them , what kind ofwith tools, were youand giving them; was the government giving away poison or traps?
Bill: Well we would, we would give them some , you knowbaits like zinc phosphide grain to treat orchards for voles., the mouse/vole control, but wWe would’d also; we show them how to use it safely. T and thhen they would be able to order this the bait through their county extension agent.
where they could order the, the products and, and use those to reduce you know the damage.
Jerry: Given today’s views on things, was zinc phosphide, is that a pretty hot item? What about secondary poisonings?
Bill: It, it really didn’t have the secondary affect. I’m sure that non-target rodents , you know, I’m sure itwere affected. , them. I don’t know if it’s registered today and whether they’re still using it or not. We did have applications where you would put the treated grain underground., Wwe’d have like a littleto, make a little furrow burrow and actually it’s almost like; it’s an artificial tunnel along the drip lines of the trees. T and then the voles would get in and use those tunnels and it’d drop treated grain.
And at the time I mean wWe also used strychnine back you know in those days. wWe would use strychnine treated baits in certain applications and certainly that’s a chemical that’s not going tonna be specific. to, to anything; like if you’re using We would use strychnine treated eggs for predator control like where skunks were preying on pheasant nests. or whatever, tThere’s a long story about Dick Smith and the Congressman’s 8
2
dog. where theyDick was were doing predator control on a wildlife management area on an Kelly’s island out in Lake Erie, Kelly’s Island. And tThey put these dummy nests out would have fakewith strychnine treated eggs. and they had, place was beingThe island was overrun by skunks and it was a popular pheasant hunting area area.out in Ohio. The skunks were eating all of the pheasant eggs. So Dick and his crew had put out these dummy nests,. T they ’rewere all well marked with (inaudible) and everything.so that the public would not disturb them.
Jerry: This Dick Smith was your supervisor? was your supervisor still?
Bill: Yes he was my boss at the time. And long story short, a crow picked up one of these strychnine treated eggs and was flying over this a Congressman’s summer home. Something startled the crow, this is what we suspect happened. I it’s the only way that we can think that this thing happened. The crow Ddropped the egg in the Congressman’s front yard, his golden retriever ran down and promptly ate the egg. And by the time he got up to the front porch it went into throws of death and in front of the kids and everything else. And so heThe Congressman found out about the program and called the went back got hold of acting Regional Director found out what was going on and pretty much and wanted him to fire Dick Smith. but did not have that, make that occur but iIt took a little bitlot of explaining to convince folks the Congressman that we were certainly acting within the , the precautions that you knowprotocallsprotocols and procedures that we’d are set out for using those kinds of thingsthose types of programs.
.
Jerry: Okay. How long were you at Lansing then?
Bill: I was there seven years.
Jerry: Seven years.
Bill: Mm-uh
Jerry: Where did you go after Lansing?
Bill: After Lansing I moved up to the Regional Office as a staff biologist with Animal Damage Control. or maybe at that time Wildlife Services. Wes Jones was my immediate supervisor in the Regional Office and Jack Hemphill was the Regional Director; Dale (unsure of last name)Del Rassmusen was also up there as Assistant orthe Regional Supervisor of the Endangered Species program and Federal Aid.. So Deanna and I and Shan and Jennifer lived in an apartment in Hudson, Wisconsin.
for…let’s see Endangered Species I guess it was in Minneapolis. So anyway I was in the staff biologist position for ADC under Wes Jones for a year and then Jim Engel, who was the senior staff biologist for the Endangered Species Program, he had a detail back in D.C. I think it was and so I moved over and was acting Endangered Species Biologist in, for the, you know, for another year. W while I was there . Aand workeding for Dale RaspitsonDel Rassmusen, at that time. And after that Jack Hemphill nominated me and encouraged me to apply and then nominated me for the dDepartmental’s mManagement dDevelopment training pProgram, (DMDP) in Washington, D.C.
Program.
Jerry: What grade were you now at this time?
Bill: I think…I think I was a GS- 12 maybe a, when I got to D.Cwas with Animal Damage Control and as. I was a GS- 13. So I don’t know, I must have gotten a 13 when I was acting you know as the Endangered Species Senior Biologistone of the senior Biologist for Endangered Species. So Deanna and I and the kids well we had, back in Michigan we had the two daughters Chan Shan and Jennifer lived in an apartment in Hudson, Wisconsin..
Jerry: They’d come along by this time.
Bill: Yesah.They were born in Lansing And so we, we left Minnesota and took off and drove.
Jerry: Minnesota, Lansing.
Bill: Drove out to…
Jerry: Michigan.
Bill: …to well no we’re in the Regional Office.
(Speaking at same time) 9
2
Jerry: Oh okay you’re in the Regional Office.
Bill: Yeah, Yeah.
Jerry: I’m sorry.
(End speaking at same time)
Bill: So we left, we left Minneapolis and we lived in Hudson, which is just across the River, a lot of the folks from the Regional Office they lived in Hudson. Anyway we took off and went to,drove to D.C. W we found a townhouse in Reston, Virginia VVirginia .and joined the, the car poolers and all the traffic heading into D.C.. and that would be we moved to D.C. in 1977 I think it was; ’1977, and ’1978 was the, the firstwere the two years of the DMDP Program. and The programthat was just really a fabulous experience for me and for the family too,. W we really enjoyed our time in D.C.
The Department Program,T the first ten months of the program consisted of training sessions and internships on Capitol Hill, the private sector, other Government agencies and your imagination is your only limitation. and what kind of assignments that you can have. I spent four months of the ten months working for a Congressmen from Minnesota, Jim Oberstar who’s still a member of Congress now. At that time ANILCA, the Alaska Lands Legislation, was going through Congress and he basically handed me all of the briefing materials that the dDepartment of the Interior was providing the members of Congress and t on the, the committee that was handling this legislation. and I became his staff person for that and it was fun to prepare him for hearings. and Bill Bob Herbst at that time was Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks. And so here ’is, you know, the Assistant Secretary and here I am a GS- 13 sitting behind a Congressmen writing questions for him to ask the Assistant Secretary so it was kind of a heady atmosphere really. And tThe legislation did pass.;
I had other a good assignments one with The Defenders of Wildlife,…which one was it, it was a group that opposed Animal Damage Control. but I wanted to go over and see what, where they were coming from.
And I can’t, I’m drawing a blank right now Jerry I can’t remember what.
Jerry: Okay. Let’s step back a minute, let’s step back a minute Bill. Let’s go back to your days in East Lansing and then the Minneapolis and then your move on there. What was your quality of life like? You obviously, you were went from a 9 to an 11, 12 then you were a 13 when you went to D.C.
Bill: Yeah I was an GS-11 I think in Lansing. I don’t know if I got a 12 there or not I can’t remember. But we started out with a small house that we rented in a really nice neighborhood; Bill (unsure of last name)Fuchs was the sSenior Law Enforcement aAgent for , you know,the Fish and Wildlife Service in Lansing and he lived two doors down from us. W and we became good friends with he and his wife. We made a lot of really good friends in Michigan. , a lot of really good friends and Deanna was busy being a mom you know with two , you know, toddlers and newborns and toddlers. And so you know I think it was, we did really well,. W we were able to save up our money and, and we bought our first house in Lansing. And you know sold it eventually when we moved on to, to Minneapolis; we didn’t buy in Minneapolis cuz because we didn’t know how long we were going to be there so we rented an apartment. And stayed there, iIn fact I went up to Minneapolis before Deanna and stayed up there for several months and thenbefore she came up with the kids and we lived in an apartment.
Jerry: Then you went on to D.C. Did you rent there as well?
Bill: No we bought, we bought a townhouse in Reston and Iwe did, did well when we sold it. W, we made some money on that, that house although it took a long time to sell but.
Jerry: What else did you do on your DMDP Program; you said you had the (inaudible, speaking at same time).
Bill: I’ll maybe think of it here in a little bit. But I…
Jerry: But you were on the ten-month program?
Bill: No, Yeah well iIit was a two year program. but, but…I worked for Jack Berryman in Animal Damage Control. , hHe 10
2
was the Chief of ADC and I helped him set up a , he started, became a, started a new office in Washington. Aand so I helped him get that all set up and at the end of that he asked me if I wanted , you know, to come to the, his, the Washington office and work on his staff. and I told thanked him for his offer but declined.I didn’t think so you know
I spent five and a half years in D.C. Other assignments included shadowed shadowing Director Lynn Greenwalt. Then I after I , youalso had regular training classes. you had to go to. Then aAfter I finished my ten-month Programs then you, youI still needed to stay another fourteen months before your my tour was officially up and, and. A at that time the Alaska Lands Legislation, ANILCA, had passed and the Bob Herbst had assigned Dick Myshak who was Deputy Assistant Secretary with the task of putting together a group of staffers. They would come from the Bureau of Outdoor Recreation, which is no longer, and, is no longer a Bureau in Interior, and the Park Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service, to began developing plans for implementing ANILCA. And so we spent….
Jerry: DIA BIA wasn’t included in this?
Bill: No it was not. We had two Fish and Wildlife Service folks, myself and Gary Burke. And a pPark sService representative and a BOR representative and so our job was to go through the legislation and figure out, you know, what the implementation plans, you know, what were needed to be developed.; Wwe worked with the Bureaus and our respected Directors to get you knowthe plans put together., wWe’d traveled up to Alaska on two or three occasions. We would provide briefings for the Assistant Secretary and then we’dto go over to the White House and brief the CEQ, Council of Environmentally Quality. , Director on progress. you know Secretary, Assistant Secretary Herbst would go over and we’d prepare all the briefing material for him. and These briefings werewas funny because one of my DMDP best buddies was working,, (this was during the Carter Administration), working for the CEQ Director. and sSo here we’d be in the Roosevelt room in the White House and he’s sitting with his boss and it was Stu Eisentadt. .was this guy’s name. And Bob Herbst and I would be on the otheron one end of table. and Stu Eisentadt on the other end of the table and then my buddy sitting next to him and me sitting next to Bob and I’d go over to the White House and we’d have lunch you know in the White House cafeteria and when the President wasn’t there. , yYou couldn’t do it today, but we’d go in the oval office and wonder walk around and it was, it was a pretty neat assignment, I really enjoyed it. So I did that and then…I went down, aAfter I completed my DMDP work, , then Ed Verburg hired me down in the Division of Program Plans. . And Ed worked for Dan Sokolowski who worked for Mike Spear at that time. And our, oOur assignment was we had a group to develop a Service Management Plan and Regional Resource Planning Guidelines and then from there we helped the Regions develop Regional Resource.
Plans so that took up…
Jerry: By this time, after you had done completed your basically your twenty-four months at DMDP, you were now in at some kind of permanent position as a biologist or administrator?
Bill: I was a staff person, a.
Jerry: You’re staff, staff biologist .
Bill: Mm-huhYes in the Division of Program Plans. I wasn’t using much biological...you know pure biological input into my staff positions it was more of a planning effort but, but having the biological background certainly you know helped you know understand what the Service was about and, and make sure the, the development of these Service Plans , you know, were biologicalybiologically based.
Jerry: Okay so you’re, in the Division of Program Plans right now, Ed Verburg your boss working on the (unclear)SMP and RRP’s. I and, and is it true , I guess it’s understanding on whythat you have those two documents on your beside table.
Bill: (Laughing) Well, they’ve, they’ve been relegated to a prominent position in my garage right now. I, I do still have 11
2
them actually. They’re probably collector’s items. M, maybe I outta should donate those to the archives or whateverNCTC. It wasn’t, it was really a good idea and Mike Spear was the person responsible for Program Management and it turned the Service in a different direction in terms of how you think about budgeting and, and evaluating you know how well we were doing. and Mike wasn’t the most popular guy; but he’s probably one of the brightest guys that the Service, you know, has ever employed.
but you know the Service forever had been doing things the way they always did. And Mike…
Jerry: And so this was more than just an exercise, this did have a lasting effect.
Bill: Absolutely!.
Jerry: And it had a positive effect on how the Service did business?
.
Bill: Well I think it did, but not everybody (inaudible speaking at same time).felt that way.
Jerry: Looking back.
Bill: Yeah, yeah Yes not everybody did Bbut I mean we needed to get into the 20th century and start you know being more competitive for budgets and everything else and, and that was you know Mike and Lynn Greenwalt’s objectives. was toThey wanted , to turn that corner and get the Service, you know, being more competitive up on the hill for, for scarce budget dollars. like they always are. So it was, iIt was a turning point -, that’s a good, good way to put it! Jerry, that’s where the Service started began and off and, and continuesd to this day: you know using that the same program management system, in terms of budgeting. And as I understand it, the Service, you know, I guess there maybe are no new ideas but some folks have been telling me that, that some of the, the things that we did back in the development of the Service Management Plan and Region Regional Resource Plans; they’re starting toare being revisited those, because tthose processes again because they were biologically based and, and had goals and objectives that you could measure.
Jerry: So the success there was the process that was used…
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …to develop?
Bill: Exactly!, exactly.
Jerry: So you were, you spent another three years in D.C. How did you get out of D.C.?
Bill: Well like tThe Service always is they had a huge reorganization and they went fromthey just closed the aArea oOffices, and went back to a Regional Office management profile. see I spent, tThe whole time the Service went into thathad aArea oOffices, phase I was back in D.C. so I wasn’t affected by that at allthe closures. . But, but you know as you know Jerry, you were in an area office.
Jerry: Yeah, but when I went to DMDP my training was leading to the area offices concept of management you know, being prepared for …
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …tthe new Region 6, which came on board and was to lead the way.
Bill: Right, right. Well so I was, I was, while that was all going on you know we were busy doing, developing our Service plans and then the process the plans that were the, the Regional ResourceArea Office Plansclosures. And so the, the Director decided, Director Greenwalt againand, the Directorate decided that they were going to get rid ofclose the aArea oOffices and that they were going to go back to the traditional pProgram Assistant Regional Directors; with Program and line management authority. I mean they had Assistant Regional Directors in the Regional Offices that were in charge of (inaudible) out the money but for the issue management the area office (inaudible, speaking at same time) they did operations. And they were fighting you know in some Regions 12
2
all the time because one guy controlled the funds and the other guy, you know, he’s got…
Jerry: (Inaudible)
Bill: …all the, yeah he’s got all the problems out there and, and he kind of thinks he knows where the money outta be spent, so there’s sort of a natural conflict I think in that approach so Greenwalt and the Directorate decided to move back to, to strictly program management and Assistant Regional Directors for programsAAfter the decisio0n was made to close Area Offices the Service advertised all of the Regional Assistant Regional DirectorR positions. If you were a ARD in the Region you had to apply for your job and if you applied for one job in a region you applied for all of the similar jobs in all of the Regions. So they the Directorate had what we called “The NFL Draft” and this would have been back in 1982, ’81 or ’82. And they, everybody had to apply that abolished area offices and everybody, tThe jobs were wide open. All the Assistant Regional Directors jobs for all the programs; Endangered Species, Refuges, Fisheries, . Did I sayand Ecological Services.?
Jerry: No.
Bill: Ecological Services. See they had two separate ones, Endangered Species and, and a…
Jerry: Habitat Conservation.Bill: Yeah. Ecological Services so there were…and tThe administrative ARD’s their jobs stayed remained in place the same because you know they weren’t duplicated (inaudible) to give out.there wasn’t a large AministrativeAdministrative presence in the Area Offices.
Jerry: Didn’t have a big admen presence in the area offices…
Bill: No, no.
Jerry: …it was program people; I was one of those that was in that draft, and had to applyedapplied for something or another.those positions but I was only eligible as a GS-13 without a promotion. There were too many GS-14’s that had to find a home for me to get promoted at that time
Bill: So, so…
Jerry: (Inaudible, speaking at same time)
Bill: …if you apply for one but tThe rules were that if you apply for one, you apply for all. So I, I applied for the Endangered Species jobs and I applied, which was were GS-a14 , and thenwhile all the others were GS-15’s; I don’t know if I was eligible. I don’t remember if I was a 14 when I left, I don’t think I was. But, so I applied for the Endangered Species jobs and I remember going, Dick Smith was or not Dick Smith buttalking to Dick Myshak, the Regional Director in Portland.was the Assistant Regional Director out here at the time and I’d known Dick you knowand I’d worked for him when I, when we did all the Alaska planning; Dick was our immediate boss. And so I called Dick up, here in Portland, and I said, “Well what do you think? ,” you know, “Sshould I apply for these things jobs or not?” And he said, “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.” And he still remembers that to this day and I said, “Well you’re right.”. So I applied. And long story short the Directorate met for this big NFL Draft and they had a matrix up here with all the Regions and then the four or five jobs you know along one axis and, and started with Regions 1 thru 7. and so they; tThe first question one of the Assistant Regional Directors or Regional Directors asked was, Lynn Greenwalt, “Is Washington Ooffice experience required to fill these positions?” And he said, “Yes, absolutely.!” And then the second one question was, “Well where” you know “What region are we going to start with?” And Lynn Greenwalt said, “Region 1.”
Well aAs it turned out…Dick Myshak, Ed Chamberland was the Assistant Regional Director out here for Endangered Species and Federal Aid. And that was Dick’s first choice but Ed had never been to Washington, he’d been, he’d worked with Florida Fish and Game and then come to the Service; fine, fine gentlemen and very capable individual. Well the good news is was, I was Dick Myshak’s second choice and so he took me for that position. and had it gone the other way, Howard Larson in Boston, I found out later, I was Howard’s first choice. So if they had started with 7, they had gotten to and worked backwards that I’dIRegion 5 I would have g gone to Boston instead of Portland. so itI was very fortuitous and that’s how I, I made the break; five and half years in D.C. it was a wonderful 13
2
experience. Would I want to go back and do it again? No, I was ready to come out andmove out of D.C.… I ’dhad never been to Portland before ‘tiluntil I came out, Deanna and I came out for a house-hunting trip. I’d been to Seattle for the World’s Fair back in ’60s something whenever the World’s fair was back in Seattle. But, sSo we packed up and came across country. In
Jerry: Okay so.
Bill: 1982.
Jerry: 1982 you packed up and came across country.
Bill: Pulled into Portland at…well tThe night before we got to Portland we stayed in Walla Walla, Washington, and I mean at that time it was , it’s really, you know, grown a lot now but back then it wasa pretty seedy town. And the girls, when we got back into the car and were on our way to Portland, they said “Boy we sure hope that Portland doesn’t look like Walla Walla, Washington.” And so no and it didn’t. But driving (inaudible) you knowthrough the Columbia River Gorge for the first time and all of that is justwas absolutely spectacular. And we got here and On my first day in the Regional Office,the first thing Dick Myshak did was taketook me over to Ed Chamberland’s office and kind of literally pushed me in his office and said, “Here’s the guy that’s taken over your job”. “You and hetwo figure out ”, you know, “how we can use him here in the Regional Office.” And then he left. Well that was kind of a harsh way to get started but Ed was fine. W we worked out a deal with Larry Debates, was the …ARD for RegugesRefuges.
Jerry: Refuge.
Bill: Refuge ARD so heLarry offered Ed the Assistant or AR, Assistant ARD job and that worked out really well for him, for both of ‘em.them. And Wally Steucke was Fisheries ARD and Joe Blum was the Ecological Services ARD at the time and Dick Myshak was the ARD Regional Director and Bill Meyer was the Deputy Regional Director. Jerry VanMeter, at that time was the Assistant Regional Director for Administration.
. So.
Jerry: So now your career is beginning in E, in Endangered Species; SE was the designation as opposed to ES. …
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …designation as opposed to ES.
Bill:
Right and iIt was really interesting that all of the ARD positions were GS- 15’s except the Endangered Species positions, which were all GS-14’s. And aAt that time ESA was just starting to rear it’s ugly head in terms of the volume of work and everything else in the, the, the toll it was going to extract from the Fish and Wildlife Service in terms of dealing with all the ESA issues. And it, that, tThe reason they did thatgraded out as a 14 was I think we still, we had some kind of cap on number of 15’s and whoever was the head personnel guy back in D.C. thought this was one way to prevent grade creep. you know thisHe believed the ESA Endangered Species thing wasn’t that big of a deal so we’re just makeing them 14’s. . So eEventually they figured it out and made them 15’s.
.
Jerry: When they did though, didn’t they merge Ecological Services and Endangered Species into one program? …
Bill: They merged at…
Jerry: …Ecological Services…
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: … and Endangered Species into one program…
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …calledRenamed it Habitat Conservation.
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: And that was at the GS- 15 15 level.(inaudible)?
Bill: YeahYes, see that’s, that’s what happened.
Jerry: But with reorganization there were The two Deputy GS-14’s.
Bill: Right. So, you know, and I; boy I went through so many reorganizations here I don’t even know how to try to begin to capture all of that and what happened.
Jerry: Okay now we’re talking 1982.
Bill: 82. 14
2
Jerry: That was the end of the, demise of the, of the Area Offices.
Bill: Mm-huh.yes
Jerry: Okay and…
Bill: T And most, I mean no surprise, I mean tThehe Pacific rRegion still included you know California and Hawaii and, and Nevada and our (inaudible) heremost of our ESA issues were down in California and in Nevada. While I was Endangered Species ARD we established Ash Meadow Refuge for Desert Pup fish down in, near Las Vegas.
We didhad, another accomplishment under, with Dick Myshak’s leadership.you know leadership, wWe wrote negotiated the first two ever hHabitat cConservation pPlans (HCPs) developed under the Endangered Species Act, the provisions in the Endangered Species Act. The first one was in on San Bruno Mountain in San Francisco, California. ; wWhen you land at the San Francisco aAirport there you’ll see San Bruno Mountain off to the west and two-thirds of that mountain has been set aside for butterfly habitat and the rest then was available for developers and that was the first, for development, housing development. and tThat was the first hHabitat cConservation pPClan that was, was completed.
And tThe second one was down innear Palm Springs in the Coachella Valley where we established a conservation planHCP there for the Coachella Valley French Fringed-toedtoad lizard. D and desert habitat was set aside ;because it was being threatened by development. And soWe went through all the biological analysis, figured out what the lizard’s needed and set that aside and set up a mechanism for funding it into perpetuity and then the development could progress.
Jerry: Bill (inaudible) take a minute, time out. here. Okay, sounds like you’re a pretty busy guy. What kind of staff did you have in Portland? And the next question I’m going to lead, how did you interact with the staff that was in the field? What was your role? You were the chief ARD of the Endangered Species Program in Portland.
Bill: I was the ARD.
Jerry: Or ARD, okay. And hHow many bodies did you have to help you do all this?
Bill: : [Sounds like tape turning back on] (We recording now?) Okay the staff that, tthat we had for Endangered Species I think I had…maybe six people.; Sandy Wilbur was the cChief of Endangered Species for me. Wayne White worked there ,…Martha Huagn, no not Martha Huagn oh what’s her name she went to beingwe had a botanist, , she went to Alaska we hadand Robyn Thorson, the current Region 1 Regional Director, also worked on our staff.
…
Jerry: Okay ‘about, you had about six bodies.
Bill: About six people, yeah yes so it was prettya, pretty you know small, small staff.
Jerry: But we the Region still had field offices, wasn’t down, you weren’t.
down in…
Bill: We had an office in Sacramento. and
Jerry: And we had one in southern California at…
Bill: We did at…Ventura I think.
[Small break in tape]
Jerry: We’re back on. What was your relationship with these offices? You had one in Sacramento and then we eventually ended up with one in Carlsbad .
Bill: Mm-huhYes. And we had another office in…in Reno.
Jerry: In Reno.
Bill: And we had an office in Olympia, . And we had one herein Portland, the field office here in Portland.
Jerry: Aand Boise.
.
Bill: And Boise. And tThe relationship waswe had with the field was that …I think the Endangered or the Ecological Services folks directly supervised whoever was in charge of those offices but, but I remember Gail Kobetich I’m pretty sure he worked for me. So we did have a relationship you know 15
2
with the supervisor relationship with some of the field offices. I know the Sacramento the one we did.
Jerry: Okay.
Bill:
We controlledalloctedallocated of the, the money for the, field offices and wrote the budgets and plans, you know, the whatever kind ofor thef program plans.
Jerry: Okay.
[Speaking at same time, inaudible]
Jerry: The listing packages were written at the field level?
…
Bill: Yes.
Jerry: …and viewedAnd reviewed byat whom?…
Bill: Yes, yeah.
Jerry: …at the Regional Office Level.
Bill: They came up here for final review and the RD’s signature and then were sent to the Washington Office for the Director’s approval.
Jerry: So they had staff like at Sacramento.
Bill: They did. They did in fact they had you know pretty good size staff because of the number of issues that they were, were working on. I remember one time going down there after the aArea oOffices closed and Gail Kobetich (inaudible) he and I was were sitting on an airplane and he said, “Man what am I going to do without Bill Sweeney” you know
“being my area manager?” And I said, “Well you’re going to be a supervisor of ...” [Phone ringing, stop in tape]
the California Endangered Species program.
End of Side 1, start of side 2 (picks up with Jerry speaking)
Jerry: …Reorganization seems to be the word asfor the ARD for Endangered Species then what happened?
Bill:
Well I hope I can get this chronologically correct. What happened was tThey combined the Endangered Species and Ecological Services functions. And at, bBy that time Dave Riley was now out here as the ARD for Endangered Species or I mean Ecological Services. in Portland. And so that left two guys for one job., M me still at a GS-14 and Dave at a GS-15. So I became Dave’s assistant for a while. and aAlso, at the same time in the Fisheries Program, Fred Vincent, who was Wally Steucke’s Deputy ARD, he was retiring. and retired. And sSoo then the plan was for me to I moved over over into Fred’s position and Wally was gonna going be soon to be retired, you know, a year or two later. I think is the way the sequence of that, maybe a year. So they were gonna try to set me up to be able get theI could apply for the ARD for Fisheries job at a 15. So when Fred retired and Wally picked me for the Deputy Fisheries position and I moved over to Fisheries. and then Wally retired and ultimately, then I became ARD for Fisheries.
Jerry: And this was your first branch into Fisheries ands here- to-fore before you’ve been either in Wildlife or Planning.
Bill: Right, right.!. And, you know, I, I’d never taken a Fisheries course in college but man if there’s a fish out there I’d love to catch it. a nd I really like fish and I and understand fish habitat and had become a crazy salmon fishermen and steelhead fishermen. and, and I was really excited about going to, to work in, in Fisheries. And…it was, iIt was really, really exciting, and challenging. W; we had so many good people working in the Regional Office there.and Wwe had fabulous folks out in the field and hatchery managers and it just; it was a really exciting times, for me.
Jerry: Okay now we’re somewhere, what year are we talking about? 19’87?
Bill: Probably
Jerry: Because see I was back in D.C. at that time and I was just coming out of D.C. and came back to the, back to the Region.
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …Fisheries.
Bill: Right.
Jerry: All this was going on while I was back there. 16
2
Bill: Yep.
Jerry: Okay, so now we’re, here we are trucking down the Fisheries Program before listings.
Bill: Well, I mean (little chuckle).,
Jerry: Before listings…
Bill: Yeah Yyes before , beforeESA listing of Pacific Salmon stocks.
Jerry: But the Region had water issues,and Indian issues.
Bill: Oh the Columbia, and I mean the Sacramento River, water issues were huge! you know wWe were working that both of the issues withon the Ecological Services side with a lot of fisheries input.; Marty (unsure of last name)Jelson’s sp?Kjelson’s his office in Stockton was collecting all the data , for the Central Valley water issues. tThe Fisheries Assistant Office , was collecting all the ddata that was used by all of the agencies and water users. thThe agencies down therein California were using to trying to manage that system to protect the aquatic habitats and Marty was just a key player. in all of that, aA lot of times they didn’t like the information that he was providing… but it was good science.
Jerry: Well.
Bill: …tThe science is a science.
Jerry: Yes it (or he) was; he’s one of the best pure scientists I think the Service had.
Bill: That’s right and you had the wonderful opportunity of supervising Marty and, and working on those issues. We had Jim Morin Warren we were really blessed with Jim Morin, one of the best fish health guys in the Service. and had him andOur hatcheries went through some pretty insignificant disease outbreaks, new diseases that we’ve had not , you know, hadhad been found in hatcheries. In one case Wwe, we wound up killing all the fish at McCall Makah Hatchery on the Indian reservation in Washington, I think.. Were you here Jerry when we did that?
Jerry: No, I was in D.C. I was the one that had to sign off on that. I had to go over to CEQ and tell them why we’re you were going to kill all these fish.
Bill: Yeah I know.
Jerry: And then also we did in a year class at Spring Creek on the Columbia River.
Bill: What was the disease, V, VHS?
Jerry: Viral Hemorrhagic Septicemia.
Bill: Right, right. . And boy that was, I mean Jim really helped me us work these difficult decisions. He helped develop and it also, the fact that we had really good policies. that these folks, there was He led a, athe establishment of a fish health group in the Northwest that Jim helped to established. Aand they had developed a set of procedures and guidelines for inin the event something like this would, would show up. And, you know, it was not an easy decision, it wasn’t a popular decision with the tribes or with even our own biologists.
Jerry: (Inaudible, speaking at same time) oObliviously the ocean, ocean commercial and the inland sports. anglers did not like this decision either.
Bill: Exactly, exactly..
Jerry: You I know but beingthat we were busy but all of a sunddensudden weall that then all a sudden you had had a new piece of legislation called the Climate KalmathKlamath River Fish and Wildlife Restoration Act. We opened a Nnew office , new emphasis onto work on … implementing the Act.
Bill: Yes, sirwe did .and Well you, you helped open that office and…
Jerry: Well I did was,and I helped do work on theat legislation in D.C.
Bill: Right., right. 17
2
Jerry: Then turned around andI was reassigned out here and ended up putting that office together. …
Bill: YeahYes.
Jerry: …aAAnd you would be the Secretary’s representative on the Kalamath River Management Council;.
Bill: Right! It was and one of my fond memories really of putting that whole program together and establishing the KalamathKlamath River Task Force. The challenge of and trying to developing a management plan for the Klamath Basin that had input from the commercial fisherman,and to recreational fishermen, the tribes, three different tribes, on the Klamath River that didn’t always get along together, the sState of California entities , and water users – 13 groups to vote by consensus. I mean iIt was a really very labor intensive process. Jerry We and I spent a lot of time in Yreka and flying down to Arcadia Arcata to go those,to those meetings and, andto work on those plans. Bill Kerr was the contractor as I recall and helped put, uus developedevelop d those plans. And wWe also had input through this group into the, we hadfrom the Klamath Fisheries Management Council (KFMC) also established by the Act, which also provided input into the Pacific Fisheries Management Council which I…on harvest management of KalamathKlamath River Chinook Salmon stocks.
Jerry: Regulate regulatory…
Bill: Right provided you know recommendations on…
Jerry: Harvest.
Bill: …tSettinghe the annual harvest levels for Klamath fish. And it was always a really interesting debate. We’d hold our meetings just immediately prior to the Pacific Fisheries Management Council meeting and we would…figure out just what share of the fish everybody should getgot. The harvest was split between the ocean commercial and sport fishermen and the three KalamathKlamath River Tribes., And like I said one of my fond memories is up The KalamathKlamath River Tribes did not have a court decision like the Northwest Tribes in Washington or Oregon had. , Federal courts in the Boldt decision had ruled that the tribes were entitled to, through their treatyies, one half of the harvestable surplus of fish that were available in both in the Columbia River and all…Puget Sound.
Jerry: On the Columbia River itThat was called the Judge Bolt decision Sound..
Bill: That’s exactly right. And, and in Puget Sound as well so there were two different decisions. and at that time Secretary, who was the secretary?There was not a similar ruling for the Kalamath River Tribes.
Jerry: It was Secretary Babbitt.
Bill: Interior Secretary Babbitt washad just been new in officeappointed by President you know the Clinton. administration had just taken over from the Reagan’s and no from Bush…
Jerry: From Bush.
Bill: Bush Senior, four-term, four year President Bush. Andand tThe Secretary and his staff they were brand new in the office and we were trying to figure out how to apply the same rule, the Bolt and Bologna as the Court decisions in Oregon and Washington to the Klamath share, tribale share. And wWe were able to get the Secretary to sign off on a letter to the Pacific Fisheries Management Council that in his the Secretary’sies opinion, that the Klamath tribes were entitled to one half of the harvestable surplus of the fish in the Klamath.
Jerry: And wWe promulgated the regulations to how it would happen,. (inaudible).
Bill: Right.
Jerry: And Babbitt went over and got the Secretary of Commerce to concur and a publish the Regulations in The fFederal RregisterRegister notice ensued.
Bill: Yep. Yes that’s how it happened.
Jerry: And the s…. hit the fan! after that, then Babbitt got so much heat he said, “I don’t won’t take anymore of this crap from Region 1 without it first being reviewed in the Department.”
Bill: Yeah, about, ifbut, if we hadn’t been Jjohnny on the spot like you knowduring the first few months of his tenure-year or as Secretary of the Interior, we would of never been able to 18
2
accomplish that, and it, it was the right thing to do. and I know he the Secretary took a lot of heat for it but it ’swas still was the right thing to do. T and the commercial guys sued and PCFFA or whatever the…the Secretary. It was t
Jerry: Pacific Coast Federation…
Jerry and Bill: Fishermen.
Jerry: Based out of San Francisco.
Bill: They sued Pacific Coast Fishermen Federation Association (PCFFA) verses Bruce. Babbitt in a court case that went and we prevailed all the way to the Supreme Court. W and we prevailed! . as I recall. If it didn’t go to the Supreme Court it certainly went to the appeals courts but both…iIt was really a landmark opinion and something that , you know, we can all be proud of..
[Jerry – a side bar note – this put credibility and some teeth into the future recommendations by the Klamath Council. It demonstrated that there were the biology personnel and the science to back-up Council recommendations outside of the political arena.]
Jerry: And then Bill, you’ve been pretty busy all along, but then we had The lLower Snake River Compensation Plan going gangbusters, - building hatcheries, fish ways, fish collection stations. We had a whole new office over therein Boise, ID that was working with the states of Oregon and Washington and Idaho to operate these facilities. So when did you have your fun time for fun?
Bill: (Laughing) Yeah that, although Wally kind of did most of the heavy lifting I think on on the Lower Snake Comp. Plan and Ed Crateau was, was managing that office ; he had, whileand (Ken Higgs was there initially). Then Ed Crateau was hired for that position and those guysthat office really did a terrific job and it, it’s a, it’s a classic example of how to approply, appropriately develop a mitigation program for, for hydroelectric productsprojects.;. This program was developed to mitigate the fishery impacts ofby the four dams on the lower Snake River. and tThey set goals and objectives and, and set up a funding stream for that, those facilities and produced millions and millions of salmon and steelhead to mitigate for those, those projects. But then along came NOAA Fisheries in the early ‘90’s and it started listings for Pacific Salmon.
Jerry: Basically, just as a short recap for the record, the NOAA, between National Marine Fishery Service (NMFS) and Fish and Wildlife Service, have different responsibilities when it comes to salmon management. NMFS is in the Department of Commerce and under NOAA. NMFS is generally salt water tying with the fish. has the ESA responsibilities for Pacific salmon and the Fish and Wildlife Service is kind like the fresh water aspect of the fish’s lives.has diverse mitigation responsibilities.
Bill: Right, right.
Jerry: But the hammer of authority is still (inaudible) with the NMFS.
Bill: With.
Jerry: …with the NMFS and….
Bill: That’s correct.
Jerry: …it’s the parent agency NOAA.NMFS is in the Department of Commerce and under NOAA.
Bill: That’s correct. And (inaudible) they, they started listing these fish and, and I think everybody could see that this was going to be similar to the spotted owl. , I mean tThe region was already going through the whole spotted owl listing issue and President Clinton came out and, andwith Vice President Gore and all the Cabinet and did the, you know,convened a big round table discussion with folks from the region and tdiscussed the impacts of the owl listing. and that’s where hePresident Clinton directed the Secretaries to begin developing his as fForest mManagement pPlan for the west side. So we could see that, that the listing of salmon was going to have a similar kind of impact on, on theon the R region. . I, I don’t think we ever dreamed that it was going to have the impact that it has right now or has had over the, the last several years; last ten or more. But we found ourselves right in the middle of all of the endangered salmon issues from reviewing listing proposals, to begin developing recovery plans, to working with harvest… issues. H, how, how do you minimize impacts on, on listed fish and still allow a harvest.?
19
2
In fact one, another psort of a, you know, proud moment of mine is thatwas when Jim Martin, who at the time was Chief of Fisheries for Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, Steve Huffaker who was Chief of Fisheries for Idaho Fish and Game and Lee Blankenship who was Senior Fisheries Scientist for Washington Department of Fisheries determined that if we were going to have any kind of fishing at all then we were going to need to to mask, be able to massk mark all of the hatchery, salmon, that are produced. It was so that the anglers could release unmarked wild listed fish. And it took us years to run through the analysis to show that by doing this we would not impact, adversely impact the data bases, the (inaudiblecoded wire tag) data bases that had been established to, you knowin to collect harvest data in ocean and freswaterfreshwater fisheries as well as survival data.,
Wdetermine stock stasis and where they’re caught and those kinds of data. And we had to convince our biologist and everybody else that it really needed to be done implemented. and tTechnology was developeding to, where machines could mass mark these fish. I and it’sts now an …effective tool that fisheries managers are using in the Northwest to be able to selectiveselectively harvest those marked fish. so that, tThat was you know reala very satisfying accomplishment from my perspective.
Jerry: Given that this conflict between agenciesagency responsibilities, other than what is activelyhas been described, described, where inter-agency and one with another (inaudible), how would describe our relationship with the NMFS and NOAA?
Bill: Well the big, let me describe the big difference in our two agencies. One tThe Regional Directors for the Fish and Wildlife Service is are a member of the Senior Executive Service. H but he/she is not a political appointee, or what we call a schedule C appointee like the Director of the Fish and Wildlife Service. is; that he’s appointed by the President you know to hold that position. . The Administrator for NOAA Fisheries in Seattle for the Northwest Region on the other hand is a political appointee so he/she’s wais very much an animal of the Bush current Administration, (and during this period it was Bush), for example. And certainly, you know, has got a lot more pressure placed on him/her to conform with, with the administration’s policies and views then, thaen what a Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Director has. So having, you know, that as a major difference we have two agencies that have endangered species responsibility.
We, tThe Service has much broader ESA responsibilities than NOAA fisheries. B but they, if you’re in the fish business, they’re the big dog on the block because they’re listing salmon and steelhead throughout the Northwest and California. And wWe sit down in inter-agency groups with NOAA Fisheries to try to work on the development of, of…you know plans on how you’re gonna to manage the Columbia River for example. And, you know,The NOAA Fisheries the scientists will come in and give them the interagency group all of their data and information. ; I’d say most of the time scientifically, we agree with them,. although However, there are some scientists up in Seattle at the Mount lLake Research Center that their have a different scientific view of the fish and their its well being is slightly different then ourthan the Service doess.. They think that transportation of fish and in barges and things like that is an effective way to move fish through this system of nine hydro dams., our Service , biologists and states and tribe’s biologists firmly believed that that’s transportation is not in the best interest of the fish and, and they have the scientific data to show for itsupport that view. But those kinds of, one starting with the, with the different bias on the science and then having the political influence from the administrator often mayThe NOAA Regional Administrator who is a political appointee may bend the Endangered Species Act to the point where in our joint meetings at policy level, the administrator and Regional Directors, we go through point by point of where we don’t think they’re you knowbelieve they are using the best science and interpreting the Aact correctly. and here’s what we see as the consequences and then they go ahead and do it anyway. And then NOAA Fisheries gets sued and they the environmental supporters takes them to court here in Portland. 20
2
T and the judge pretty much goes through all the points that we made at our earlier , without our help advising him on that, and basically says meetings with NOAA and the other Federal Agencies. The Judge then says, “You got it all wrong, go back and start over again..”. And we’reWe are on about the fourth iteration of this thing right now.the Biological Opinion on the Columbia River Hydro System.
Jerry: Okay now yYou’ve been in the Fisheries Program now for a number of years and you retired leave the Fisheries Program basically out of the Fisheries Program. and move to other positions. Okay now it seems like with all this much fun you’re having in fish, sounds like it’s about time for a reorganization.
Bill: : Well I, I was yeah let’s…I mean we The Service went, we went through some several different reorganizations…
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: …also during this time.
Jerry: Okay now it seems like with all this much fun you’re having in fish, sounds like it’s about time for a reorganization Bill.
Bill: Well, we (chuckling) I think we had at least two or three. We then went from a Program Management System to; we decide that we wanted to have Ggeographic and ProgramaticProgrammatic ARD’s.. And so what we did was you became responsible for, like certain geographic area, I became the geographic ARD for the Columbia Basin. And at one, one reorganization I was in charge of all the refuges, all the ES offices and all the Fisheries in the Basin. And at the same time, I had Fisheries, in one iteration, I had Fisheries Program responsibilities so I was doing all the budgets for all of the Fisheries offices in, in the Region. And let’s see we did that for…
Jerry: And similarly there was another ARD that had a program responsibility for the Ecological Services… program, a
Bill: Right.
Jerry: …Prprogram that did all the funding and… for Ecological Services, Endangered Species, and Wetlands activities as well as operational responsibilities on an geographic basis…
Bill: Right. After five years we reorganized again.
Jerry: …budgeting for Ecological Services, Endangered Species, Wetlands…
Bill: Yeah.s
Jerry: …and As well as operational responsibilities on an geographic basis…
Bill: Like For Oregon and Washington.
Jerry: …And for Klamath Basin in California.
Bill: Yeahs.
Jerry: Yeah.
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: And then, what did we do?
Jerry: After five years we had been (inaudible).reorganized again.
Bill: Yeah Yes.and then wWWe went back to strictly pProgramaticProgrammatic ARD’s. and at thatThis time , so I was, Dan Diggs was became already, he was the Fisheries ARD. at that time I believe for…I think he became the Fisheries ARD when I was the pragmatic ARD, I think. Anyway whatever happened, no maybe he didn’t maybe he was my assistant just like you were.
Jerry: I was (inaudible) Ecological…
Bill: Yeah.
Jerry: …Services and Supervisor of California Klamath Basin.
Bill: Right. So then… Jerry: But the point is we is that went back to the program
Bill: Right.
Jerry: … (Inaudible) again and you ended up going to…What position did you have after this reorganization?
Bill: Well I could’ve become Fisheries ARD again if I wanted. I I mean thatit was my call. And I went to the Regional 21
2
Director…at that time it would of been (unsure of name), (unsure of name). Marv Plenert.
Jerry: No it was after (inaudible) it had to be Marve…
Bill: Marve, I went to Marve. And saidI told him, “You know,” I said “I’ve already done all that Fisheries ARD stuff.position and it was time for Dan Diggs to take that responsibility.” And w”We ’ve gothave all this the Endangered Species stuff issues on the Columbia River that, you knowso I, why don’t you just make me a Special Assistant for, to the Regional Director for Columbia River issues?”. And “I can be a surrogate you for all of these meetings and issues with NOAA Fisheries, and Bonneville Power, and the Corps of Engineers, and and everybody else that is involved these, other Federal Agencies, the States and Tribes involved thesee planning efforts and the development of bBiological oOpinions on the…” imactsimpacts of the Federal Hydropower System.”. He agreed!
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: “…impact of running the river.”
Jerry: And this is basically what you were doing then up until your retirement.
Bill: That’s correct.
Jerry: When did you retire?
Bill: I retired on December 31, 2004.
Jerry: That’s three or four years or three years ago.
Bill: Yeah, yeahs and I guess maybe just kind of wrap it; I mean tThe last few years was, you know, just a wonderful time during my career. I, I didn’t have to supervise anybody but I worked with all of the ARD’s and their staffs to get input on the various issues that, that I was working on. It, it was interesting, and challenging work. I just had an absolute ball; it was , you know, a grand time.
Jerry: Reflecting back on this grand time, if you had to pick an issue out of your 37- year career, what was the most burning issue that probably caused you to lose sleep or it was most important to the Service?
Bill: Wow (or well.)
Jerry: Can you?
Bill: Well there ’sare two or three the Klamath one you know with the water issues, one and where the Secretary of the Interior Norton shut off the water going down the Klamath River , you knowand diverted it for the irrigators.
Another, was Tthe, this whole Columbia River …planningEndangered Species Biological Opinion process for operations of the, the hydro-power system with Bonneville Power and the Corps of Engineers and Bureau of Reclamation. And NOAA Fisheries Fisheries whas got to be, it just was so frustrating because nobody wanted to listen to , you knowour opinion on, the proper way to implement the act. Nobody wanted to make the scarifiessacrifices and provide what the fish really needed which was water spill andwere flows. I mean everybody; yYou don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know what these fish need in the Columbia -- water but nobody’s….
Jerry: (Inaudible) water.
Bill: Yeahs bBut nobody was’s willing to bite the bullet and charge the electricity rate payers more money. and tThey were’re always trying to , you know, do a second class job. sSo that was frustrating.
Jerry: But that was one of the most pressing or major issues that you were dealing with?
Bill: Probably the biggest, biggest one.issue was when And I, I worked directly with Ann Klee, who was a sSpecial cCouncil to Secretary Norton Kempthorn on an adjudication issue for Snake River water rights with the tribes and the Bureau of Reclamation and the water users in Idaho. And she called me a lot of nasty names sometime myself and Bob Turner, who works for NOAA Fisheries, , weand I were just trying to make sure that this agreement would pass the biological rRed fFace 22
2
test when we had to look at it through ESA compliance. …you know filters to see whether it would pass muster We were representing our biologist and their input to the process and that was another one tissue that would keep you awake at night as well, so.. There was a lot of political pressure from the Secretary’s Office.
Jerry: Let’s, oOn kind of along the same line, what was a, what would you class as a high point in your career?
Something that really turned you on.
Bill: Well I that, some of those accomplishments I kind of mentioned earlier but certainly the completion of the first two Habitat Conservation Plans under ESA that was really exciting for me. The…I helpeding establish a rRefuge for endangered fish in a rRefuge sSystem that really, at that time, believed that the only refuge you should ever have would be for ducks. And to get an endangered little pup fish out in some desert springs was unheard of. and so that, I feel that like that was really a , ansignificant accomplishment.
The mass marking of Pacific Salmon hatchery fish, an issue, I’m proud to have been apart of that.
And I guess you know finally the, the…the real accomplishment was the outstanding people working, beingI was able to work with. the people that, that I’d been fortunate to work with, you included Jerry it’s, it’s a you know I don’t know where you’d find an agency where you have people that are, are more dedicated and committed to doing what’s right, working in frustrating conditions and situations. and just you knowThey putting their head down and shoulder to the wheel and got etting the job done. They are and, and really proud of the Service and what it , what it’s all about sostands for. , you know, that that’s one of the real fond things that I look onon thThe people are the heart of the Fish and Wildlife Service.
.
Jerry: Let’s do the flip side of that. W, was there a lotw point? Sound like you’d been pretty successful in (inaudible)your career but is there something that youmay wish if there was a do over?
Or something that’s because of the circumstances.
Bill: Oh yeah there’s probably more than one. One that I can think of and, and I don’t know if I’d do it over. I mean the outcome was the right outcome that was necessary. but Ann Badgely was the Regional Director at the time and afterwhen the, the Forest Service and the Fish and Wildlife Service and BLM developed the President’s Forest Management Plan for the Spotted Owl. on the west side,Following the development of that plan, President Clinton said, “Well that’s such a great idea, let’s do it on the east side. Forest Service and BLM lands.”
So they poured millions and millions of dollars into this planning effort. and of course tThe Fish and Wildlife Service is actively involved in, in helping develop these plans and figuring out riparian buffer widths for, foron fish bearing streams and all of thesemany very complicated natural resource issues to protect both fish and wildlife and maintain clean water. and all of these kinds of things and, and wWe invested hundreds of thousands of hours of our staff time in working on these plans and negotiating, you know, all of these incredible details. and these; I mean tThe documents were like telephone directories, you know, they were’re huge documents.
And wWe would brief the Secretary ; we’d briefand David Hazysee who was the Under Secretary, the number two person in the Interior. Regularly he would try to intervene and help mediate the discussions. W where we’d get inwe would have biological issues situations where we just could not sign off on these plans. because, for biological reasons, and so the Forest Service, Wwe had the executive committee whciwhich consisted of like three or four rRegional fForesters and same SstateState dDirectors for BLM and, and the Fish and Wildlife Service Regional Director and NOAA Fisheries Regional Administrator.. We’d get on the phone and this was right at the end of the Clinton administration. W and we got down to crunch time where we either had to acquiesce and give up a 23
2
whole bunch, which would cost some adverse affects on the natural resources in
Tthe Columbia River Basin or go along with it.
So we’re on a conference call with Ann Badgely and Donna Darm and from NOAA Fisheries and Will (unsure of last name)Stelle and the RegionaRegional aAdministrator of NOAA and all the; David Haze Hayse the Under Secretary Secretary of Interior. B and basically we had to say we can’t go along with it.the Plan. And, and I looked Ann in the eye , we were in our conference room,and I put the phone on mute and I said, “We can’t do this! .” And I said “We’re just giving up everything if we do.” So she stood tall and, and said “No, we’re not going to do itsupport the Plan.” And David Haze just kind of threw a fight fit he said, “You know I’ve worked in a lot of difficult situations and I’ve, we’vehave always found ways to come to an agreement and I’ve just never seen anything like thiese group here.” And he hung up. And I really had a lot of respect for that guy. H, he was terrific and I wish, I wish there had a, had been more time in a way where we could of, you know, to come together, maybe face to face with him, and just to see if we could find a solution to that problem and complete the, the plans. I and everything else but and it died on the vine.
I mean it just…
Jerry: Okay.
Bill: And iIt may have been too big an effort to begin with, the Columbia Basin’s the size of France and how do you write a Natural Resource Plan for an area that big, so?. I don’t know. That would be a nice one to do over over.I think if we could.
Jerry: Let’s jump tracks a little bit. Is there, can you single out a person or persons that helped shape your career, or persons? Who’s had the biggest influence on you?, Bill
(inaudible, Bill starts talking)?
Bill: Well there’s been several.
Jerry: Did they Aacted as mentors or..?
Bill: Mm-huh.Yes.
Jerry: Guidance counselor?
Bill: The first one, and I still talk to him regularly, regul, regularly, is Doctor Hank Sather who was my major professor and helped me get started in , in themy career with the Fish and Wildlife Service. but Ccertainly his influences as my major professor and, and on my committee you know for my graduate degree, had a tremendous influence on me. Th
en… Dick Smith, you know my second supervisor, has always been a close personal friend. and Hhe ultimately became Deputy Director for a number of years. And Dick and I talk fairly regularly, still today asre good friends and he’s always been one I’ve turned to for advice.
Dick Myshak, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Fish Wildlife and Parks and a Region 1 RD , was a good and neighbor ‘til he moved to California and who also gave me, gave me good advanceadvice.
And Deanna , I, you know, shehas… been an insperationinspiration and a stongstrong supporter of my career. She has
Jerry: Well.
Bill: She’s stood by me through , you know, all these moves and really, really played an important role in our partnership with the family of the Fish and Wildlife Service family. and oOur doors were always open to people that , you know, would be coming into town or whatever, so.on business.
Jerry: Okay, . I Want to ask another little question. here. Of all of the things thatchanges that you’ve seen that in the Fish and Wildlife Service metamorphize or change over the years. Wwhat do you see havehas been really a good thing that’s happened in the Service? In your opinion?for the organization?
Bill: Well I think one thing, and it’s still not enough. , but I think the budgets back when you and I started our careers Jerry, you know, paile in comparison to what the budgets are today. 24
2
Grant it I, I know if you went and talked to any Regional Director they’d probably say there’s still , you know, a huge need out there but I, I think when we started getting a half a billion dollar budget for the Service you know it was like we were kind of getting out of the tiny little agency arena and up into one where you had , you know, thousands of people working for us and doing good things for, for the resource...
And I also think that the ability of this agency to maintain its scientific integrity is really important. and I think they’re really, you know, the biologist biologists out therein the Service are really trying to do, to maintain that standard. It may getThe data may have different translations as it goes moves up the food chain and the closer you get , you know, to the political appointees. T things are going to change in them. . That use to frustrated me a lot until a friend of mine who was in NOAA Fisheries, Don Knoll is the guys name, he was fairly high up back in D.C. and he said, “You know, you shouldn’t get so frustrated because you gotta need to understand they won the election. , you know. If the administration does things that you don’t agree with, you have to step back and say yeah, they did win, you know.” And, you know, I, I don’t even want to get started with this the Bush administration.; I’m glad I retired when I did and I still had a positive attitude but I can understand the pressures put on our folks today. It have has to be, has to be very difficult to try to get them to, to do the right things. And I think the Director Dale Hall, you knowwho is a good friend of mine, is trying to do that and has brought some positive leadership back to the sService.
which, which we’ve needed.
Jerry: On the flip side again, have you seen things in the Service that they’ve given up doing that you think was wrong? That is actually been detractedion from the quality of the Service?
Or you have a pretty positive…
Bill: Well no, no I…backOne example was when Secretary Babbitt was sold a bill of goods to take rResearch out of the Fish and Wildlife Service and put it in Geological Survey. was the, I mean I, I think Bruce Babbitt’s one of the best Secretaries we’ve ever had. He’s second to Cecil Andrus in my opinion who I think was one of the really great ones but, but when he got sold a bill of goods to pull rResearch out of the Fish and Wildlife Service a…
Jerry: Capital R research.
Bill: Exactly. And put it over in Geological Survey was the biggest mistake that he ever made. That technical biological arm of the Fish and Wildlife Service really focused on, on things that were important to us and we didn’t have to go through a whole new, you know, dDirector and everything else with different priorities;. wWe had our own labs, we you know we built a beautiful lab up in Seattle for Fisheries and Aquatic Research. And nNow we hardly ever talk to them. And iIt’s a shame! , you know. And I think that’s the biggest mistake I’ve ever seen that…this agency’s madke.
Jerry: Bill I’m going to ask you about , you knowhow, it’s not been all work and no play. That there were events and there’s things that have happened; there’s gotta has to be some stories about your career that illustrate the fcomradely the foolishness,un times and the other aspects that just, they’re some of them are just good yarns. Do you have anything that you’d like to get on record?
Bill: Oh dear, I have lots of them. I it’s whether I can. ; tThis would probably be a lot juicer if you know youwe had a couple of drinks (laughing).
Jerry: Well this isn’t an afternoon session…
Bill: Right, right.
Jerry: …(inaudible) have to do this at…
Bill: I’m drinking water so we’re okay. (Inaudible) I remember when I was in Michigan we were doing a pesticide study and we were collecting all different kinds of, of aquatic birds and animals and whatever and we went onto the Shiawassee rRefuge in Saginaw Refuge in Michigan. And so we’re, we’ve got you know aWe have a Federal gGame aAgent with us and we’re driving with the new refuge biologist, a 25
2
brand spanking new you know shiny penny right out of college. , you know, was with us and I’m sitting on the hood of a government vehicle holding a shotgun, driving the back roads in, in Michigan in, on the refuge. And here’sThere was a whole flock of shorebirds on the other side of the, the water control, the ditch. Sso I ground (unclear)slucedsluiced them and I must have killed eight or ten. I don’t know how many and well it’s winter and the water is really, really cold.
so we’re talking well…
Jerry: But you’re sitting up on the hood of this thing with a shot gun?
Bill: Yeah.
Jerry: Oh.
Bill: Yeah (laughing).
Jerry: You were literally riding shot gun.
Bill: Yeah, (laughing) Exactly. And, and so , so the biologistwe said, (inaudible) said, “We’ll we ’reneed to go back and get a canoe and then we can paddle over and get it” and whatever.the birds. And we said, “Okay well we’ll do that.” The biologist said, “Oh we don’t have to do that.” Well wWe talked him into taking off all of his clothes off and he goes down and jumps in this, (laughing) this ice-cold water and swam across and picked up these birds. So he was a great retriever, he took hand signals pretty well but his nose wasn’t real good.
But that’s one then Another joke there was always the joke about the, the law enforcement agents, who wasare and they were a pretty ruckus bunch, way back when but not so much anymore. but way back when. They, they worked hard and they played hard and they drank hard. And I think tThis same biologist I spoke about, we had one time you know had a bottle of Jim Beam and or something and, and were passing it back and forth in a paper sack and thenwhile we were we getinggetting ready to go eat.
t…
Jerry: In a Government car?
Bill: Yeahp! , then we, wWe were getting ready to go eat and he’s sitting back there and he’s just green as can be. and hHe is ’s hanging out the window, eventually, you know, loosing his lunch. We really (inaudible). Law eEnforcement guys were really, really notorious for that kind of stuff stuff. and you always, theThere was a question was, you know,: “Do you know why law enforcement agents drink Jim Beam whiskey?” And the answer is, “Because it comes in a square bottle and it will not roll out from underneath the seat of the car.”
One other time I remember when I went down to Horicon National Wildlife Refuge in Wisconsin from Minneapolis and I was going to help law enforcement guys…do a patrol, you know, on goose hunting patrol on the refuge for the weekend. ; I just thought it would be interesting., something to do. So I get down there, I driveove down from Minneapolis after work and get there it’s probablyat 9:30 , 10:00 and checked into the hotel, motel where the guys agents are staying. Oand of course they’re all in bed asleep. and the galThe girl who was checking me in said, “Oh Mr. Shake, well” you know “it’s nice to see you.” Your friends are already here, in fact they wanted to know which room you were going to be in ” and whatever “and wanted to get the key.” And I thought well that’s great maybe they probably left me a , you know, glass of whiskey or something and they’d meet down, meet themme down in the lobby the next morning. And sSo I go in my room and I’m looking around and there’s no drink poured or anything. and so I go in to use the bathroom and here’s a live Canada goose standing in my bathtub, live.. Standing is the operative word. Well they had found this goose andthere was goose shit poop all over my bathtub, I mean you can’t imagine what it looked like. So I had left him in there the tub. you know andI get up the next morning and let him loose in the room and wash out the tub so I can take a shower. And I go down to meet these guys with this goose under my arm the next morning. and the, Tthey found this goose walking across the road as they were coming out of the refuge. T and they have a place pen on the Refuge where they put crippled geese, you know, on the refuge and try to see if they’re gonna goninggoing to recover. make it or not and sSo they thought it would be fun to , you know, just 26
2
put the goose in my room for the evening and then they will deliver it to the pen the next day. But they were, theyThe LE Agents were always doing stuff like that; it was, was really a lot of fun. But let’s see, let’s pause it for a sec… (paused).
So another time, telling stories on myself, I, I was in Lansing, Michigan. and I was scheduled to pick up two guys from the rRegional oOffice that were flying into …Detroit,orDetroit or so I thought. T, that’s the operative word, to pick up ‘em they’re they were going to spend a week out in the field field with me.or whatever and man I got up late and I’m going like crazy and I wheel into the airport at Detroit and I’ve got the flight numbers and everything else and I park the car and I run in and I read onlook at the reader board and I, you know, I just kind of did it, by two wheels really to, to get in there on time.. And there’s no flight number that matched and of course that was back before cell phones or anything else. and then I got to really studying the itinerary and they flew into Toledo (laughing), which is about an hour away. So somehow I got a hold of them, I don’t know, I can’t remember exactly how I did it but I got a hold of theym, I mean they’re not going to go anyway cuz I’m their ride but tThat was pretty embarrassing for me to not even be able to get the right airport , you know, for picking up the big wigs from the rRegional oOffice.
Deanna and I one time at, I guess you know I mentioned we would often have people come over and spend the night with us and, and when we first went to work and lived in this wonderful old house in Lafayette, Indiana. It was a hundred year old house., and tThe Regional Supervisor, Ki Faulkner, for Animal Damage Control came down to visit the Lafayette office. W and we had all day meetings with him and whatever and so we invited him to …come out and have dinner with us and then spend the night. cuz we lived outside in the country and so (inaudible) thought that was a good idea andAt that that time I’d been shooting a lot of ducks so we, that was ourour sort of usual company meal would be roast duck. and Deanna did a really nice job at fixingpreparing the meal. that andAfter dinner we said good night. finally got ready for bed and hisKi’s bedroom was upstairs on the second floor. and get up and he goes upstairs and we’reDeanna and I get in bed and all of a sudden we hear this huge crash and I go running upstairs. Well the, I’d had forgotten the flats on thithats, my dad cut bed slats for theses box springs and the mattress too short., well you know iIf you kind of bounced on the bed the wrong way or whatever the slats were just too short and they would fall out. And so here i’s Ki Faulkner , you know, with his feet sticking up in the air you know the mattress , you know, (laughing)was down in between the side boards of the bed. O; oh man, that was embarrassing. I think we wound up just putting him on the floor, put the mattress on the floor. (inaudible).
But…wWe had a lot of good times with the ADC folks., a lot of, you know, we’d, we’dWe conducted work these surveys of bird damage to field corn. damage surveys and we’d…working on chemical…that we, chemical,We were field testing a chemical called Avitrol which we placed on cracked corn and then we would have theis treated grain applied by ag spray planes. chemically treated corn that we’d spray on corn fields and then theWhen the flocks of red-winged black birds would , wouldenter the field and some would eat it off the ground and go into distress and give calls that would frighten the rest of the birds from the field.calls . And so I remember Dick Smith and I, we’d stay in this, you know, were staying in a cabin really up on Lake Erie shores and in the evening and we’d just sit there and shoot boxes of shells at black birds just streaming into the marsh, you know, for, forto roosting at night. We also we used this same compound, Avaitral andit was called, and we’d put it on, on chunks of bread and then you’d feed that to sea gulls. Y and you’d get two or three gulls going through distress and you could scare them off of a garbage dump. And I got was called to go down to Cleveland to show these guysthe airport authorities how to use Aviatral on the dump, which was on one end of the runway at the Cleveland Airport which was boarded by right along Lake Erie. and on the east end of the run way is their The garbage dump attracted thousands of gulls , which is a you knowwere big hazard for, for aircraft coming inlanding or taking off. with all these birds, you know, right in the flight line. So we would go out to the dump and there would be ’s several thousands gulls on the thingfeeding on the 27
2
garbage. and I would start chumming them in with clean bread crumbs and to get them closer and use to their wolfing ‘emeating the pieces of bread. down and I then would throw out three or four of the se treated pieces. T and then the gulls would start going through this their distress calls and they’re flopping on the ground and they’re giving off distress calls and so all thesethe thousands of gulls take off;. tThey’re all alarmed and they start spiraling right straight up over the end of the runway and here’s these planes, are coming in for a landing. you know, they’re like several thousand feet up. And Tthese planes are coming right through these masses of gulls and I thought, “Oh boy if I, if I cause a plane wreck, this is probably not going to be a real good thing for the Fish and Wildlife Service.” (Laughing) But anyway, we use to have a lot of fun.
Jerry: We’re coming to the end here, Bill. D; do you have any, any final thoughts?
Bill: Well I, one I really appreciate the opportunity Jerry, to be able to do this. I think the history of the an agency or organization is really important and I think collecting these oral histories are gonnawill be , you know, a real benefit for the agency itself and also for others who wanna, wannawant to take a look at how we have arrived at where we are today;. iIt’s always good to go back and look at the history. so that’sIt’s been really a privilege for me to be able to do it and I know you’ve been doing a lot of these and it takes a lot of your time and I really appreciate that.
. And I…
Jerry: And it also provides an opportunity to ground truth the things the way they really were more than what you’d see in an official cleansed report to Congress.
…
Bill: Exactly.
Jerry: …or in a report to the Secretary. This is the battle lines that were drawn on the ground by the people who were there.
Bill: Yeps. That’s right, that’s exactly right. And I guess just, you know, iIn summary, in terms of my career with the Fish and Wildlife Service been just you know couldn’t have been better in my opinion. I’ve been really fortunate to work with a lot of great people and work on a lot of really interesting issues. I personally feel like I, I got out at the right time in two thousand, the end of 2004. I think were I to be, be employed right now with the Fish and Wildlife Service with the current administration, I’d probably be very, very frustrated. But hopefully that with Dale Hall , you know, he’s goat the helm and, andhe is doing a good job. B but boy this has been a tough bumpy road for, for the folks that are in the trenches and I urge them to just hang on, we’ve only got 342 days or something like that, I think, left to go so a. And stay true to the science. Anyway, thanks again for doing this.
Jerry: Glad to do it Bill. This is Jerry Grover, who’s been interviewing Bill Shake, doing the oral history. And it’s on the 10th day of February 2008 on an lovely Oregon day.
28
2